Real stink coming from your rubbish bin
THE DIRTY TRUTH ABOUT YOUR RUBBISH Channel 4, 8pm SHOCKING news for those of us who painstakingly separate our rubbish – a lot of it isn’t even being recycled.
So despite battling the constant “which bin?” problem, and remaining baffled by more than 50 different recycling symbols on products, is it even doing any good?
In this Dispatches film, environmental journalist and campaigner Lucy Siegle investigates the rise of waste incineration in the UK, examining how millions of tons of rubbish that we leave out for recycling ends up being burned.
She says: “I’ve watched the phenomenal rise in waste incineration across the UK.
“Up until the mid-90s we sent 90% of our waste to landfill.
“It was a cheap and easy way to dispose of our rubbish. But its impact on the environment was catastrophic.”
The solution was to burn it. But burning waste creates more carbon emissions than you think and could be holding back our recycling rates.
There are currently 48 incinerators around the country, with another 18 on the way.
It’s the cheapest and easiest solution at the moment, but exclusive research in this programme reveals that incineration is on course to become the UK’s dirtiest form of energy production.
The show also looks at how councils are locked into expensive multimillion pound contracts with incinerator operators, forcing them to burn waste for decades to come. “So they’re trapped?” asks Lucy. Meanwhile, a spotlight on other countries reveals how the UK is falling behind.
“There are major concerns,” Lucy tells us.