Meeting told of low-cost answers to waste crisis

There are low-cost solutions to the Republic's waste crisis and most people are paying too much for waste-management, a conference in Dublin has been told.

A number of experts said markets could be found for most household waste once it was carefully separated. A target of zero waste for manufacturing processes was also realistic.

An Taisce, the National Trust for Ireland, told the conference in the Tailors' Guild Hall yesterday that it would run a pilot project in one Irish county early next year to encourage zero waste targeting.

According to An Taisce president Mr Frank Corcoran, many industrial processes are ideal for a zero-waste target. Mr Corcoran cited the computer industry, where he said parts were eminently reusable and where a number of companies already had on-site facilities to reuse waste in the manufacturing process.

Mr Robin Murray of the Centre for the Study of Global Governance at the London School of Economics said even nappies and plastic bags were now being made of biodegradable materials useable as compost.

While nappies were 4 per cent of the average municipal waste stream, they became 16 per cent of the residual waste after initial separation. He advised delegates from local authorities and environmental organisations to remember, "a biodegradable nappy is a wonderful lunch box to a worm".

While the world's "environmental crisis" is leading to increased costs, particularly in terms of waste-treatment, new technology permitted old goods and services to be produced in new ways at lower costs.

Mr Murray gave as examples material recovery, energy productivity, eco-housing and offices, as well as low-energy appliances such as fridges, as areas where this was already happening.

Mr Murray said the traditional difficulty in changing behaviour - particularly in dense urban areas - had been overcome. In Tower Hamlets in London (a high-density, high-rise area), it had been shown that handing control of the collection process to the local residents made participation rates of 60 to 80 per cent possible.

"Once you move to that level of take-up, the cost per tonne for collection falls radically," he said.

Mr Matthew Pumfrey, who is involved in the development of zero-waste solutions in New Zealand, said there were significant opportunities for entrepreneurs in resource recovery. He said some of the world's largest corporations, such as Mitsubishi, are developing zero-waste policies.

A surveyor with Dublin property firm Jones Lang LaSalle, Mr George Ross, said that separation at source was the key and could be achieved using a three-bin system. The Republic, he said, was at a transition point in the development of its infrastructure.

The conference was jointly organised by An Taisce, the environmental group VOICE, and the Zero Waste Alliance.