Public will have a say over Super City rubbish and recycling schemes

Photo / Dean Purcell

Aucklanders will have a chance to say what kind of rubbish and recycling service they want after the Super City decides on a plan in April next year.

A spokesman for the Auckland Transition Agency, which is setting up the Super City, said issues such as how many bins were given to each household and whether there was a collection for kitchen scraps would be one of the first things to be decided after the new council was elected in October.

Consultants advising the transition agency say the city needs a single rubbish collection system to cut waste and save money - and recommend the council should set up a business unit to take control of rubbish and recycling from private operators.

The confidential report by PricewaterhouseCoopers does not support any particular bin system - that will be a matter for officials to weigh up before the Super City is formed.

But one suggestion is that each household could get either two wheelie bins (rubbish and recycling) or three bins (rubbish, recycling and compost) under a standardised regional system.

The transition agency has asked officials working in its planning and environment team to draft a Super City waste plan by July.

The new council will make a decision in April 2011 before consulting the public.

It will consider issues such as whether to increase fees paid to take rubbish to the dump and whether organic food and garden scraps should be collected from the kerb.

A major issue is that councils control as little as 10 per cent of the waste stream in Auckland, giving them little power to cut waste as they are required to do by Government targets.

PricewaterhouseCoopers said the private waste companies that controlled the rest had little incentive to cut the amount of rubbish dumped because they were paid by the tonne.

Complicating matters is that the Super City will inherit a web of contracts with companies which process and collect rubbish and recycling in different parts of the region.

Managing those contracts and creating a single regional rubbish system will be one of the challenges.

A table of contracts attached to the PricewaterhouseCoopers report shows many contracts expire between this year and 2015, but some have a decade or more to run.

Finding a way to manage them and create a single regional rubbish system will be one of the challenges when the Super City melds the seven councils together.

Visy's contracts to process kerbside recycling for Auckland and Manukau cities run until 2022.

Transpacific Industries' contract for rubbish and recycling on Waiheke Island, granted last year after fierce opposition from residents, runs until June 2019.

Meanwhile, councils, led by Waitakere and Manukau, have been working together to investigate whether they could collect kitchen and garden scraps - which make up about half of household landfill waste - and turn them into fertiliser.

A report by consultant Morrison Low notes a three bin system worked well in Christchurch and Timaru.