Introduction
The average household in Scotland produces just over 1.1 tonnes of waste per year (equivalent to around 540kg per person) 1. Longer term trends suggest that this has been increasing by around 1.5% - 2% per year. There are a number of reasons for this increase such as increased disposable incomes, more single person households, convenience led lifestyles, fashion trends and the relatively low cost of food. These types of demographic and societal issues are difficult to influence.
Scotland has made significant efforts in recent years to increase recycling and composting rates and has now reached around 25% 2. However, although recycling and composting are better than disposal options such as landfill and incineration, there are still environmental and economic costs related to these activities. Furthermore, as waste arisings increase so does the amount of waste requiring recycling/composting to meet targets. As outlined in the waste hierarchy, it is far better not to produce the waste in the first place.
A key aim of the National Waste Plan is to stop growth in municipal waste by 2010 then reduce it thereafter. This would mean that municipal waste arisings would need to be halted at a maximum of 3.76 million tonnes per annum 3. In other words, if waste growth continued at its current long-term rate, the increase in municipal waste arisings between 2006 and 2010 could be over 270,000 tonnes. We need to act now to curb this growth and reverse this trend.
To achieve this, we need to address the elements of waste from the average household which can be reduced, particularly the levels of residual waste being produced which cannot be recycled or composted. A consultation on 'Preventing Household Waste in Scotland' was issued by the Scottish Executive and SEPA in February 2006 requesting responses by the end of April. This consultation can be found at: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/02/02131916/0. A total of 170 responses were received: 91 from organisations and 79 from individuals.
A summary of the analysis of the responses to the consultation can be found on the Scottish Executive website at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/08/09111254/0 and the full analysis at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2006/08/09110835/0. The consultation posed a series of 42 questions based on 5 key themes: product design and manufacture, retailers, consumers, communities and local authorities. This plan outlines specific actions within each of the key themes. We intend these actions to be measurable where possible and to build on existing work being done to prevent household waste.
The following 20 action points have been selected on the basis of responses to the consultation, what is considered achievable at Scotland level and, where possible, what can be measured / quantified in tonnage or other terms.
For the purposes of this Action Plan waste prevention includes the following:-
- Strict avoidance - the complete prevention of waste generation by, for example, reducing unnecessary consumption
- Reduction - reducing waste by designing and consuming products which generate less waste
- Product re-use - re-using a product in its original form, for its original purpose or for an alternative use
- Qualitative waste prevention - reducing the hazardousness of waste
N.B. while strictly speaking, home composting and community composting are not waste prevention (as waste is still produced), they are included in this Action Plan as they are key measures to reduce the amount of waste collected by local authorities.