Burying our rubbish in huge pits in the ground is no longer an option in the 21st Century

It is time to start talking rubbish
Stuart Wardlaw, BBC Green Room 14 Jul 09;

Burying our rubbish in huge pits in the ground is no longer an option in the 21st Century, says Stuart Wardlaw. In this week's Green Room, he argues that a range of measures - some more popular than others - is needed if the UK is going to get on top of its waste problem.

Research reveals that Britain is still considered the "dustbin of Europe" because it is still dumping more household waste into landfill than any other EU nation.

It threw away a staggering 22.6 million tonnes of rubbish in 2004/5; in fact, Britain sent the same amount to landfill as the 18 EU countries with the lowest landfill rates combined, despite these places having twice the population of the UK.

Britain's failure to invest in the more sustainable waste management practices based on the three Rs - re-use, recycle and recovery - has lead to an excessive dependence on landfill.

But these days are fast disappearing.

Planning and environmental permitting of landfills has been made significantly tougher with the aim of better controlling their environmental impacts.

However, this has substantially reduced the availability of suitable sites. If you compare this to our disproportionately large population to land mass ratio then, put simply, we are running out of space to dump our waste.

As a result, we may face a landfill shortage within the decade, according to the Local Government Association.

Packing it in

Our consumer culture does nothing to help our overflowing landfills.

Rapid obsolescence of goods created a buoyant sales market, as people were encouraged to spend and buy, replacing anything at the first sign of wear and tear, improved functionality or passing fashions.

Many of these products have also been heavily packaged, which is resulting in larger quantities of waste, despite legislation to encourage recycling and recovery of packaging.

Recognising the problem, the EU in 1999 introduced the Landfill Directive, which stated that levels of waste going to landfill across Europe had to be reduced to 35% of 1995 levels by 2020.

The UK government has devised several strategies to address the targets, each with a common theme: it is local authorities and householders who are expected to do most.

With the concentrated efforts local authorities have made with recycling initiatives, such as rolling out collection services for dry recyclables (glass, plastic, paper, cardboard) and green waste (garden waste and, in some instances, food waste), and reducing rubbish collections to once a fortnight, we have made a significant impact on landfill levels.

Some more controversial initiatives, such as "pay as you throw" schemes and penalties for failure to recycle, have proved unpopular to the extent that most councils have steered clear of them.

Despite the significant efforts of councils and households, there are serious doubts whether Britain can achieve an interim target of halving the amount of waste ending up in landfills by 2013.

The money of waste

The Audit Commission, the UK's public spending watchdog, reported that councils could be liable for fines up to £2m if their landfill diversion targets are not met.

These costs are likely to be passed on to council taxpayers.

The report also advises on the need to invest in incinerators, in order to have the maximum impact on landfill levels.

This method of disposal often meets resistance from campaign groups who would prefer not to incinerate on their own doorstep, despite a new generation of safer, cleaner incinerators.

Moreover, when taking into account the complex logistics surrounding the planning and development of incinerators, these facilities involve significant capital expenditure and lengthy roll-out times.

Out of home

It is not just householders who need to consider the amount of waste they produce.

The refuse generated by the business sector adds significant volume to landfills and must be addressed in order to improve Britain's waste management performance.

Failure to significantly reduce the level of waste being sent to landfill at a corporate level will also affect council taxpayers, as the Audit Commission clearly states.

So councils are making huge strides, but in order to take landfill diversion to the next level though, it is clear that this will require a significant investment in energy-from-waste and other technologies, such as mechanical and biological treatment.

Last year, the Isle of Wight unveiled a £16m gasification plant - one of the few in existence - with a view to transforming 30,000 tonnes of rubbish into electricity for 3,000 homes.

The island already boasts an impressive 50% recycling rate and the plant will process the residual waste.

This not only proves that such solutions can work, but also that they can be accepted by the community.

So, what will happen if Britain does not stem the flow of rubbish?

Imagine a major European city where the streets are strewn with rotting waste, and where another European country has to step in and manage the rubbish through a vastly superior disposal system.

This "doomsday scenario" might sound extreme; but it has already happened.

The streets of Naples, Italy's second largest city, were buried beneath piles of rubbish after its landfill sites were closed.

As a result, 700 tonnes of refuse was transported to Hamburg, Germany, each day as an emergency measure.

The cost of developing and implementing large-scale sustainable waste policies may seem a daunting prospect, but with rapidly diminishing landfill space and the political imperative to "green" our waste management services, we no longer have a choice.

Stuart Wardlaw is head of the environment and safety team at Dickinson Dees, a UK law firm

The Green Room is a series of opinion articles on environmental topics running weekly on the BBC News website