THE first year of new refuse and recycling arrangements in Lochaber has been hailed a “great success” by Highland Council.
April 2011 saw the introduction of a fortnightly refuse collection alternating with a fortnightly mixed recycling collection for paper, cardboard, food tins, drink cans and plastic bottles.
Figures released by the council to coincide with National Recycle Week show that since the new collections started, the amount of recyclable material collected at the kerbside in Lochaber has increased by over 800 tonnes compared to the previous year.
In addition, the amount of waste sent to landfill in Duisky from refuse collections has reduced by 2,600 tonnes.
Chairman of the council’s TEC Services committee, Councillor Graham Phillips said: “These figures clearly show that the people of Lochaber have fully embraced the changes and taken on board the greater recycling ethos in today’s society.
“I would like to thank householders for their commitment to helping the council work towards the Zero Waste Targets.”
The roll out of the new collections to Sutherland in July will complete the introduction of the new service across the whole Highland area.
The latest figures show that the Highland recycling rate has increased from 34 per cent to 39 per cent and that last year the amount of recyclable material collected throughout the region increased by 5,500 tonnes to 58,379 with waste down from 102,000 to 90,000 tonnes.
The council’s commercial waste customers are also now obliged to recycle as a condition of their contract.
The material collected in the blue recycling bins in Lochaber gets bulked up at the Duisky landfill site from where it is transported to a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) in Grangemouth. Here the materials are separated, baled and sent on for re-processing.
