End of Tauranga's kerbside glass recycling 'ridiculous'

The decision to scrap glass recycling collection in the Western Bay of Plenty has been labelled as "ridiculous" by those opposed to the plan.

Waste management confirmed the change in how it collects glass would come into effect on March 1.

Customers will be expected to take their glass waste to community glass deposit bins themselves for recycling. The bin locations are expected to be announced next month.

Waste Management's David Howie in a statement said current glass recycling posed unacceptable safety risks to staff, was commercially unsustainable and "was often counter-productive in diverting waste from landfill".

"We have recycled mixed glass at our Mount Maunganui site for a long time. But the glass is often broken into small pieces and needs to be sorted into different colour streams.

"This creates an unacceptable health hazard for our staff handling the broken glass and also means other recycling products are easily contaminated by the shards. This leads to materials that could otherwise be recycled being diverted to landfill."

Orchardist Rob Thode was "very disappointed and quite annoyed" with the decision.

"It just seems ridiculous to me. I pay to recycle, and I would expect Waste Management to ... use a bit of imagination or whatever they need to do to make it work.

Thode said people in the agricultural and horticultural industries were working hard to be more environmentally friendly.

Thode said he recycled about 50 per cent of his household waste. "I try to do what I can."

"I'm trying to do things as a sustainable business. That's certainly what our industry is moving towards.

"I'd rather see them [Waste Management] moving forwards not backwards. I'd happily pay for a separate glass recycling container."

Tauranga City Council's environment committee chairman Steve Morris was also disappointed and concerned more glass would end up in the landfill.

Morris said the recycling dangers identified by Waste Management were overcome in other New Zealand cities "so surely we can overcome them too".

"Unfortunately, because Tauranga's kerbside collections are privately managed, council has no control over which materials the private waste operators choose to collect."

Waste Management said in a written statement that customers committed to recycling understood its decision.

Waste Management said it considered a range of options over the past 18 months and the decision "was not taken lightly".

"Our investment in special glass collection bins reflects our commitment to recycle as much material as possible from the region while keeping our team safe."

Future of recycling in Tauranga

In October 2017, the Environment Committee recommended that Tauranga City Council support, in principle, including a proposal to introduce rates-funded kerbside collections for Tauranga in the draft 2018-28 Long Term Plan.

The committee agreed that not only would a Tauranga City Council-managed kerbside collection service make it easier for all households to recycle, it would also enable the council to have greater influence over the range of materials that could be recycled, which is not currently possible with privately managed services.

Council is expected to decide on whether to include the proposal in the Long Term Plan in December. If included, more information about the proposed service will be available on Council's website, and community feedback would be sought through the draft Long Term Plan consultation process in March/April 2018.