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Almost half of Christchurch’s recycling goes to landfills because it is contaminated with waste, including weapons and dead animals.
Photo: RNZ / Conan Young
During the level 4 closure when recycling was not possible to sort, the council allowed households to use their yellow recycling bins for general waste.
Eco-Central, owned by Christchurch City Council, handles recycling for the city.
Compliance manager Averil Stevenson said that in the 12 months before the shutdown, only three recycling trucks were sent to the landfill, but now 42 percent are being dumped.
“We are finding dead animals, chainsaws, diapers, guns and vacuum cleaners among other household items in the recycling bins.”
The council has spent more than $ 1 million sending the contaminated recycling to landfill.
Stevenson said that prior to Covid-19, the recycling plant processed 200 tons per day and had 30 employees working 10 hours a day.
“We were producing 20 to 40 containers per week of salvaged material and selling it locally where we could, even then there was a marked increase in waste in recycling.”
With international markets shutting down mills, Eco Central stopped processing recycling on April 1 and didn’t start again until May 4.
“We haven’t recovered since then and we’re going downhill anyway,” Stevenson said.
“Every recycle load from Christchurch City Council containers comes to us and falls to the ground; staff examine it and assess the level of waste; if it is high, the entire load is rejected.
He said international markets had reopened and were hungry for recycled material because many countries are still closed.
“It is frustrating that there is a great need for good quality recycled material in the market and we are missing the opportunity to supply it,” Stevenson said.
The council has teams on the streets assessing containers and if someone is a repeat offender, they run the risk of having the container taken away.
