Waste Statement for Carmarthenshire
Introduction
The purpose of the waste statement is to set out what the Council has done to date to meet its statutory recycling and waste targets, our performance to date, and what we will deliver over the next few years up to 2025
Carmarthenshire County Council provides waste services to approximately 91,000 households. We provide the following collections:
- Fortnightly residual black bag kerbside collection
- Fortnightly co-mingled (blue bag) kerbside recycling collection
- Weekly food collection.
- Fortnightly hygiene collection on request
- Bulky items and garden waste chargeable collection on request
In addition, we provide four Household Waste Recycling Centres located at Whitland, Wernddu, Nantycaws and Trostre and smaller recycling sites across the county for glass, small electricals, textiles, and media.
Our Waste Strategy
Our strategy is derived from Welsh Government’s current overarching waste strategy document ‘Towards Zero Waste’. It outlines high level outcomes, policies, and targets for Local Authorities to follow. It guides us on how to manage domestic waste generated in Wales in a manner that creates environmental, economic, and social wellbeing benefits.
The government has also released its ‘Beyond Recycling’ strategy which focuses on a more circular economy, using waste as a resource and reducing carbon. It sets out more detailed targets for us to follow, to take Wales from 3rd in the world at recycling to being 1st.
Our vision and aim in Carmarthenshire is to work towards achieving the statutory targets set within the Welsh Government strategy, ensuring that we do our bit to achieve ‘Zero Waste' by 2050. These statutory targets mean that Welsh Government has legislative powers to fine Councils that do not achieve the set targets of municipal waste being recycled, prepared for re-use, or composted. This can result in fines of £200 per tonne for every tonne of waste that Carmarthenshire fails to process via the waste hierarchy.
Diverting waste from landfill is a priority and failure to divert ‘Biodegradable Municipal Waste’ from landfill includes a further £200 per tonne over the specified allowance.
We will align with the policies and targets set within the Welsh Government strategies with a clear focus on a circular economy, net zero carbon pledge, cleaner environment, and a strategy to further develop the good work already achieved by Wales and our standing as third best recyclers in the world. Carmarthenshire’s goal is to play our part in an overall Wales achievement and be a high performing county in respect of reduction, re-use, and recycling of our waste now and in the future.
How we will achieve our aims and targets
We will work in partnership with Cwm Environmental Ltd., a waste company that is wholly owned by Carmarthenshire County Council. The company receives most of Carmarthenshire’s municipal waste and is responsible for processing, treating, recycling and disposal of the waste collected by the Council. It is also responsible for preparing items for re-use where possible.
The company operates treatment, sorting and processing facilities at its Nant y Caws headquarters in Carmarthen and operates all the household waste recycling centres in the County on behalf of the Council.
Consultation
We actively engage with residents, local members, CWM Environmental Ltd, and various other stakeholders, to ensure we provide the best possible service within the resource and timeframes available. A public consultation survey was carried out in June 2021 on future waste changes. The opinions captured were provided to Councillors to guide them in their decision making on the future of waste collections.
We hold local member briefings on all waste related changes and our waste/ recycling webpages have been developed to provide advice, guidance and explanations on services offered. We work closely with our customer services and marketing and media team, to ensure this information is up to date and relevant to our customers.
We respond and act on feedback and questions received via, telephone, email, social media and ‘Ask a question’ platforms available to the public. This input from the public is crucial for us to provide the correct level of information to support residents to recycle as much of their waste as possible. A comprehensive A-Z of recycling has been developed for ease of reference.
Our performance so far
We have progressed well since the welsh government strategy was sanctioned in 2010 and have met all statutory targets to date. The next statutory target is 70% for year 2024/2025
| Financial Year based on statutory recycling target | CCC Total Recycling % | Welsh Government Statutory Target % |
|---|---|---|
| 2010/2011 | 43.13% | 40% |
| 2012/2013 | 53.77% | 50% |
| 2015/2016 | 63.52% | 58% |
| 2019/2020 | 64.66 | 64% |
| 2024/2025 | 70% |
Changes made over the last 6 years
We are continuingly making changes to waste services to ensure that we provide the best possible recycling service to residents and meet our statutory targets.
| 2016 |
Extended kerbside recycling to all households in the county. Introduced a new subscription garden waste collection, via a dedicated chargeable wheeled bin service. |
|---|---|
| 2017 |
Commenced annual delivery of 3 rolls of blue recycling bags to all households. |
| 2018 |
Added 3 rolls of food bin liners to the annual deliveries. Encouraging more households to recycle their food. |
|
2019 |
Introduced considerable changes at our recycling centres, to boost recycling rates and reduce costs resulting from illegal commercial use and prioritise a high level of service for Carmarthenshire residents. Commercial waste was banned and permits introduced for commercial type vehicles. Residency checks were put in place, as well as sorting of any black bagged waste brought into the sites. |
|
2020 |
Increased the number of glass recycling containers across our recycling sites. |
| 2021 | Diverted Absorbent Hygiene Products (AHP) from landfill by the introduction of a new hygiene waste collection service. |
Moving forward, the next few years in Carmarthenshire
Welsh Government funding has facilitated in addition to the hygiene waste collection service introduced in Autumn 2021 a new nappy waste collection service which will be introduced in Spring 2022. Residents who subscribe to this free service, will be provided with purple bags, which will be collected fortnightly. The waste will be processed at Nappy Cycle in Capel Hendre. During processing, materials like plastic are recovered and recycled where possible.
Garden waste
Additional garden waste vehicles will allow us to extend the scheme to even more households and make the service more efficient. All garden waste is processed at Nantycaws to produce ‘Merlin’s Magic Compost’.
Reuse projects
Carmarthenshire has secured Welsh Government circular economy grant funding to build a reuse village at Nanytycaws and open a reuse shop in Llanelli Town Centre. The ‘Eto’ project was launched in February 2022 with the opening of Llanelli shop, the reuse village is due to open in Spring 2022. Residents will be able to donate waste items suitable for reuse/repair at all our recycling centres, reducing waste and giving them a second life.
This move is to facilitate more reuse and repair opportunities for residents, encouraging them to reduce their waste as a priority before considering any recycling options. It will give residents an opportunity to purchase items at an affordable price whilst reusing an item that in the past would have been thrown away.
Paint Reuse Facility
Via the government’s Circular Economy funding a paint reuse facility is due to start in spring 2022 at Nantycaws, whereby water-based emulsion paints received at the four HWRC will be mixed and resold in our ‘Eto’ reuse shops.
Commercial Recycling Centre
A commercial waste recycling facility is being developed at Nantycaws. It will provide an outlet for the business sector in Carmarthenshire to recycle and re-use their waste. Once segregated the waste will become a resource for recycling recovery markets, for use in the creation of sustainable products, working towards the circular economy ambitions of Welsh Government.
This facility will significantly increase the capture of recyclable waste from local businesses. Providing opportunities to re-use and recycle more of their waste, reduce their carbon footprint, and become more resource efficient. This will enable local businesses to save money on disposal costs to become more resilient and achieve positive environmental outcomes.
Future changes to kerbside recycling collections
From Autumn 2022, we will start collecting:
- Blue bags every week
- Glass collections every three weeks
- Black bags every three weeks – up to a maximum of three bags per collection
- Food waste will continue to be collected weekly.
In 2024, we will introduce:
- Separate weekly collections of glass, paper, cardboard, cans and plastic, textiles and batteries and small household appliances.
Chargeable garden waste collections and free nappy & hygiene collections will continue as subscription services, collected fortnightly.
