Recycling? 40% of rubbish is just sent for burning
THE proportion of waste incinerated by councils in England has risen fourfold in a decade, with almost 40 per cent of waste now burnt rather than recycled or sent to landfill.
The country now burns 38.5 per cent of all rubbish collected – just as recycling rates have largely stagnated.
A decade ago, England burned just 11 per cent of all household waste collected.
Official figures for 123 local authority areas reveal that 40 councils now burn more than half of all plastic, paper and household rubbish collected.
Some councils are burning more than 80 per cent of all waste collected despite government targets to recycle half of all household waste by 2020.
The revelations come on the day a London Assembly report into incineration warned the practice could be adding to air pollution and even causing cancer.
On Saturday the Daily Mail revealed that 21 incinerators have fired up across Britain since 2010 when there were only 23. A further 18 incinerators – known as ‘energy from waste’ plants – are currently under construction. Scientists and politicians have complained of health risks associated with large plants including the release of harmful toxins and the build-up of greenhouse gases.
Despite these fears, in London, the West Midlands and the north-east of England, more rubbish is now burned than recycled, figures uncovered by the Mail show.
The worst council offenders are Westminster and Lewisham, in south east London, where a staggering 82 per cent of plastic, paper and household rubbish was burned between April 2016 and 2017. Westminster, in central London, recycled just 16 per cent of waste, the most up-to-date figures from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs show.
Sunderland and Slough, in Berkshire, are the only local authorities outside London to burn more than 70 per cent of waste collected. The incineration table covers 123 local authority areas.
York and the Isles of Scilly are the only areas where no rubbish is burned. However, this is instead sent to landfill. The findings paint a bleak picture as England, spurred on by the Mail’s Turn the Tide on Plastic campaign, attempts to recycle more.
By contrast Wales, which is one of the best countries in the world for recycling household waste, incinerates only 24.5 per cent of rubbish.
In 2006/7, England incinerated around 3.2million tonnes of household waste. By 2016/7, the amount had more than trebled to 10million tonnes, Defra figures show.
Councils regularly lock themselves into long-term contracts of 25 years or more with private waste management companies to incinerate their rubbish.
This means they are tied into providing a certain amount of waste to be incinerated each year, despite householders making more effort to recycle. Last night Green Party peer Baroness Jones called the situation ‘a tragedy’.
‘It has been obvious for some time now that the minute councils lock in to long-term contracts with incinerators then incineration increases at the expense of recycling,’ she said.
The London Assembly environment committee looked into how London disposes of its waste.
Their damning findings, released today, said recyclable materials are ‘unnecessarily’ going to incineration, including plastics, which are ‘potentially hazardous’ to health when burnt.
The report pointed to a 2008 study by the British Society for Ecological Medicine which ‘noted a link between incineration and cancers, birth defects and cardiovascular mortality’.
However the report conceded that evidence around health impacts remains ‘inconclusive’.
An ongoing Public Health England study has compared incinerator emissions to traffic pollution but noted they are not deemed a ‘significant risk’ to health.
A lack of government oversight has been blamed for the increase in number of incinerators across the UK. Local authorities are free to grant planning permission as they see fit, meaning some ‘energy from waste’ plants can spring up within mere miles of another.
Defra said its 25-year plan looked at further ways to reduce avoidable waste and recycle more.
Lewisham Council said: ‘Incinerated waste from Lewisham is turned into electricity and fed into the National Grid. Recycling rates in Lewisham are rising.’ Westminster was contacted for comment.
The release of harmful toxins ‘Significant risk to health’