City of Sydney exceeds NSW waste diversion targets

The City of Sydney has announced that it has diverted almost 70% - or about 20,000 tonnes - of its household waste from landfill each year. As noted by Lord Mayor Clover Moore, this makes it one of seven councils in NSW to exceed the state government’s target of diverting 66% of household waste from landfill by 2014.

On average, each city resident produces about 329 kg of household waste each year, all of which is collected and taken directly to a waste treatment facility where any remaining recyclables are recovered and organic materials are processed to produce low-grade compost.

As part of this waste removal and recycling process, more than 20,000 tonnes of rubbish is diverted annually from landfill, meaning about 24,000 tonnes of carbon emissions from methane gases won’t be entering the atmosphere.

In addition to the city’s traditional kerbside recycling service, other ongoing resource recovery efforts include:

• processing household garbage into low-grade compost;
• new e-waste trials in city apartment blocks; and
• battery, bulb and mobile phone recycling stations in community centres and libraries.

The city’s e-waste apartment recycling trial.

“Our apartment recycling stations provide a simple solution for residents to get rid of waste,” Moore said. “We installed six stations in January and in the first month collected around two tonnes of e-waste, batteries and light bulbs for recycling.

“The city is trialling a range of new initiatives to make it easier for the community to responsibly dispose of unwanted and potentially toxic waste,” she concluded.

For more information, visit www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/live/waste-and-recycling