More to sort out without landfill

Waste Management’s (left) South Island general manager Gareth James, Otago regional manager Greg Nel and Oamaru refuse transfer station operation’s supervisor Allister Murdoch look around the refuse station shed where trash will be sorted before being taken to a landfill outside of North Otago. Photo: Shannon Gillies.

The landfill would close on April 22, the same day the transfer station, to be run by rubbish disposal chain Waste Management, in Industrial Pl is scheduled to open.

Waste Management’s South Island general manager Gareth James said the Oamaru site was expected to employ nine people, a growth of two new positions, and Waitaki Resource Recovery Trust business manager Dave Clare said jobs at the recovery park site could increase.

He believed the transfer station would be able to better identify recyclable items from Oamaru’s rubbish and divert the materials to his team’s facility.

The transfer station was to act as a gathering point for the town’s waste and the rubbish would then be transported to an as-yet-undisclosed location.

Mr James said the reason why the location could not be named was his company was still to negotiate a price for a landfill.

Each year the company could change where it sends the town’s waste, he said, because landfills change their prices on a regular basis.

He also refused to state the cost of the site’s construction.

He said the 0.945ha Oamaru transfer site was expected to process between  5000 and 10,000 tonnes of rubbish each year, but "the facility is large enough for much higher volumes than anticipated".

Landfills were no longer the answer to waste disposal issues as they once were for smaller communities, he said.

New refuse stations could be built to meet demands of new environmental legislation around gases and leachate.

Mr James had a background in local government and he said when he first arrived in that industry, more than 20 years ago, there were hundreds of landfills across the country. Over time, those numbers have dwindled to about 50.

Since the Resource Management Act came in, every institution  had to examine its environmental practices, he said, and a massive leap in environmental standards had resulted.

shannon.gillies@odt.co.nz