I HAD an enlightening conversation with a representative of FOCSA – West Devon Borough Council's contractors for rubbish collection – who last week had called to clear rubbish left behind by the collection crew on Thursday's collection round — but that's another story.
He told me that it is not a requirement that the non-recycled domestic rubbish is contained in a black plastic sack; merely that it is contained (eg, in a dustbin!). Therefore, rubbish may be left loose in a dustbin for emptying into the rubbish cart. This started me thinking.
Currently, West Devon has something like 15,000 households. If each household were to use two black plastic rubbish sacks a week, this would mean that the borough would be contributing 1.5-million (non-biodegradable) black plastic rubbish sacks a year to landfill —at a time when we are being encouraged to recycle more, re-use (plastic) bags etc.
This would represent an additional 50 tons of plastic rubbish a year, the purpose of which is merely to contain rubbish from the doorstep to the rubbish cart — the bag is broken as soon as it is compressed in the cart. Furthermore, it represents an expenditure of about £50,000 a year by West Devon households, purely on rubbish!
Further thoughts —food waste is not required to be contained in the (biodegradable) corn starch bags so thoughtfully provided for the food recycling caddies, merely to be placed in the caddies. As the bags are inordinately expensive, why not present any dry waste unwrapped, and wrap messy waste in some other biodegradable material, such as kitchen towel or newspaper? This saves money and saves adding waste to waste.
John P Lucas
Gowmans Terrace
North Tawton