Yesterday, I promised to return to the topic of waste collections in Brent where important changes are mooted. One of the less noticed aspects of our 2011 proposals was that they dramatically reduced Brent's production of green house gases from waste.
An increase of collection frequency raises the spectre of greater emissions, which would be unfortunate. This is not necessarily the case, as if there is less waste in the bin for a weekly collection (as there should be), it may be possible to redesign the rounds with fewer vehicles (and crews). I simply don't know. Again it would be good for evidence to be published.
More strikingly, the Council might consider separate glass collections. This was the best option in terms of climate change emissions in the modelling that was done for our 2011 plans. We didn't go for it partly because it would give less recycling tonnage (at a financial cost) and partly because of public concern about the sheer number of bins they would have to accommodate. I would have thought that the second of these concerns would be less likely now that the public have seen the blue bins in actions and realised that some of the scare stories were untrue.
The advantage of glass only collections is that the quality of the recyclate is much higher. This should lead to a higher price for the waste, but also means that the purer waste can be recycled back into glass, creating much lower carbon emissions. The current co-mingled collections mash all the waste together, and the glass is only suitable for aggregates, which do not yield the same carbon emission benefits. Again, I just don't know the answers on this so it would be good to have clear evidence made public.
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