Some further thoughts on unwanted goods on Rural properties
I have posted a couple of times (here and here) about a current debate on a household garbage collection service in the Carwoola - Primrose Valley area. Some of the conversation off-blog has focused, quite correctly on the need to recycle stuff rather than send it as garbage to the landfill.
In my original letter to selected Councillors I referred to the very limited knowledge base about disposal of unwanted goods in this area. I have thought a little more about this topic and decided that a third post might spell things out a bit.
As a first point it is important to note that my subject is about 'unwanted goods' rather than garbage. One persons garbage is something that someone else may be able to use. By way of example:
Quite often when I take stuff to the tip I know that some of it could be useful to others - perhaps they will have skills to repair the item or can split it into components that are useful. There is no facility at the tip for such things so I just put them to one side and allow people to see them and take them if they want. (That is strictly frowned upon by the suits who set policy for the tip, presumably muttering the bullshyte acronym OHAS, but life is too short to worry about their neuroses.)
A second group of items is things that can be recycled. On a small scale this is cans, bottles and paper. This can, and should, be handled through the household recycling collection. There are also things like rusty roofing iron and wire: surely the iron making industry can use this: if they can by dirt from Gina Reinhart and convert it to metal surely they can do the same with rusty stuff. If the response is that it is too expensive to recycle, I reply that they are getting the ore too cheaply! I am unsure about old broken white goods but suspect that many components of them could be salvaged if some entrepreneur could extract their digit and work out how to do it.
We now move on to green waste. For many things the ideal solution to that - especially in a rural residential area - is for home composting. My guess is we get through about 2 cubic metres of that a year. Woodier material (eg vine prunings, brambles) or noxious weds such as ivy, vinca, St Johns Wort and Serrated Tussock I burn once a year. It is possible to take the woody stuff to a commercial site and get it converted to mulch. Such an operation is being set up by a Councillor, but instead of charging him for his raw material Council is paying him to take it away - and the Council cries poor!
There is also a range of nasty stuff taken to th tip. Used oil, paint, batteries, herbicides etc. That is hazardous waste not garbage.
So what do we end with as garbage? Dirty nappies, dirty paper, badly torn clothes, badly broken furniture and household fittings and excessive, non-recycable packaging.
I have seen nothing indicating what proportion of stuff taken to the tip comes into each of these categories but my suspicion is that by volume the final element of pure garbage is trivial. If the council provided a good transfer station where people could separate out
I suspect there would be a trivial amount of stuff go into category 4. To make this effective for the householder it would be sensible to accumulate a load of stuff and cart it over the transfer station once or twice a year.
A second area in which there is no knowledge is the types and locations of property using the tip. My suspicion is that quite a bit of industrial material gets taken to the tip (either by the disposer or someone they have paid to remove it. This should also be assessed in a sensible plan. I have a secondary suspicion that a fair proportion of the stuff comes from the ACT where tip fees are horrendous. While tip passes must be shown it is easy to borrow someone's card.
In my original letter to selected Councillors I referred to the very limited knowledge base about disposal of unwanted goods in this area. I have thought a little more about this topic and decided that a third post might spell things out a bit.
As a first point it is important to note that my subject is about 'unwanted goods' rather than garbage. One persons garbage is something that someone else may be able to use. By way of example:
- Our compost heap is kept in order by some used pallets I picked up at a tip about 6 years ago;
- When I need a strong rope for one of many purposes I use some that I also found at a tip,
- When picking stuff from our vegie garden produce I use one of the wicker baskets rescued from the dump.
Quite often when I take stuff to the tip I know that some of it could be useful to others - perhaps they will have skills to repair the item or can split it into components that are useful. There is no facility at the tip for such things so I just put them to one side and allow people to see them and take them if they want. (That is strictly frowned upon by the suits who set policy for the tip, presumably muttering the bullshyte acronym OHAS, but life is too short to worry about their neuroses.)
A second group of items is things that can be recycled. On a small scale this is cans, bottles and paper. This can, and should, be handled through the household recycling collection. There are also things like rusty roofing iron and wire: surely the iron making industry can use this: if they can by dirt from Gina Reinhart and convert it to metal surely they can do the same with rusty stuff. If the response is that it is too expensive to recycle, I reply that they are getting the ore too cheaply! I am unsure about old broken white goods but suspect that many components of them could be salvaged if some entrepreneur could extract their digit and work out how to do it.
We now move on to green waste. For many things the ideal solution to that - especially in a rural residential area - is for home composting. My guess is we get through about 2 cubic metres of that a year. Woodier material (eg vine prunings, brambles) or noxious weds such as ivy, vinca, St Johns Wort and Serrated Tussock I burn once a year. It is possible to take the woody stuff to a commercial site and get it converted to mulch. Such an operation is being set up by a Councillor, but instead of charging him for his raw material Council is paying him to take it away - and the Council cries poor!
There is also a range of nasty stuff taken to th tip. Used oil, paint, batteries, herbicides etc. That is hazardous waste not garbage.
So what do we end with as garbage? Dirty nappies, dirty paper, badly torn clothes, badly broken furniture and household fittings and excessive, non-recycable packaging.
I have seen nothing indicating what proportion of stuff taken to the tip comes into each of these categories but my suspicion is that by volume the final element of pure garbage is trivial. If the council provided a good transfer station where people could separate out
- things that could be used by others
- recyclables;
- green waste suitable for mulching;
- Nasty stuff; and
- pure garbage
I suspect there would be a trivial amount of stuff go into category 4. To make this effective for the householder it would be sensible to accumulate a load of stuff and cart it over the transfer station once or twice a year.
A second area in which there is no knowledge is the types and locations of property using the tip. My suspicion is that quite a bit of industrial material gets taken to the tip (either by the disposer or someone they have paid to remove it. This should also be assessed in a sensible plan. I have a secondary suspicion that a fair proportion of the stuff comes from the ACT where tip fees are horrendous. While tip passes must be shown it is easy to borrow someone's card.
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