Carbon Cutting Food Waste Collections Could be 20 Years Away in North Yorkshire

Wednesday, 10 May 2023 06:00

By Matthew Pells with additional reporting from Stuart Minting, Local Democracy reporter

A carbon cutting scheme to introduce food waste collections could be delayed by up to 20 years in North Yorkshire.

The Government wants separate household food waste collections, across the country by 2025. The measure is seen as a good way of reducing carbon emissions and over half of the country's local authorities already collect food waste separately as it significantly improves recycling rates.

But North Yorkshire is being given consent to delay the introduction of the separate collections until 2043 due to both a lack of clarity about the costs involved, and already being tied to long term contracts for waste collection.

North Yorkshire Council's Climate change boss - Councillor Greg White -hopes the measures can be introduced sooner.

A meeting of the council’s executive heard how separate collections could realise up to a 3,300-tonne reduction in carbon emissions a year compared to the current arrangements.

By collecting food waste separately, the council could increase the amount that can be converted into green electricity using an anaerobic digester. The delay would mean the carbon equivalent of an extra 18 million kilometres of diesel car emissions every year.

Although the council has effectively been given consent by Whitehall mandarins to delay implementing one of its flagship carbon cutting schemes due to its waste disposal contract running until 2043, the authority’s executive members said they wanted the service launched long before that “backstop position”.

However, officers told the meeting the council had received “no further clarity” over Government funding for introducing the new food waste collection service, saying the authority faced a bill of anything up to £6.4m annually.

North Yorkshire Council Executive member - Councillor Simon Myers - says while the aspiration is to bring in the collections as soon as possible, the timing will depend on the finances.

Danby & Mulgrave Councillor David Chance agrees that more clarity is needed on the costs of making the transition to separate household food waste collections.

Despite appeals by MPs and from the council’s leader Councillor Carl Les to Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Thérèse Coffey, an officer told the meeting “in some regards we are no further ahead than we were in December”.

One executive member suggested the failure to respond to the council’s appeals for clarity over funding was due to “to-ing and fro-ing in the corridors of Whitehall”.

Climate change boss Councillor Greg White said while council wanted to launch the separate collections with a county-wide overhaul of bin collections in 2027, it faced “very significant additional costs” over the separate food waste service.

Councillor Gareth Dadd is concerned that introducing the collections without understanding the full financial costs could impact on other council service.

Several members of North Yorkshire Council’s executive underlined their recommendation to delay the service until up to 2043 to a full meeting of the authority next Wednesday in no way reflected their determination to rapidly reduce carbon emissions.