20 April 2012

Drop In Council Waste Going To Landfill

There's a continuing decrease in the amount of local authority collected municipal waste sent to landfill in Northern Ireland.

According to the latest government statistics in October to December 2011, there were 134,206 tonnes sent to landfill, resulting in a landfill rate of 61%. This was a six percentage point improvement on the 67% rate recorded for the same period last year.

The report also provides additional information on local authority collected and household waste arisings, recycling, composting and landfill. The data in this report come from returns made to WasteDataFlow by district councils in Northern Ireland at the end of each quarter. WasteDataFlow is a web based system used by all UK local authorities to report local authority collected municipal waste.

The Landfill Allowance Scheme (NI) Regulations 2004 (as amended) place a statutory responsibility on district councils, in each scheme year, to landfill no more than the quantity of biodegradable local authority collected municipal waste for which they have allowances. In the first three quarters of the 2011/12 financial year just less than half of the annual allowance of biodegradable local authority collected municipal waste that can be sent to landfill was used. This was an improvement on the 56% of the (larger) allowance used in the first three quarters of 2010/11.

(GK)