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Recycling Facts and Figures
 

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At a glance:

  • Absolute rubbish

  • How to save on garbage

  • Green waste costs money

  • Reduced energy consumption

  • Reduced ore consumption

Absolute rubbish

According to Eco Recycle Australia, on a per person basis, Australia is one of the highest producers of garbage in the world.  Every year we bury enough garbage to fill Kardinia Park to the point posts.  Apart from the financial maintenance costs, garbage buried in landfill doesn't breakdown. It remains a problem for future generations.

The price of landfill

At current prices, it costs $25,000 per week to bury waste in landfill. That's $1.3 million every year. Put another way our waste costs us approximately $35 per tonne.

Landfill sites are also being subjected to increasingly stringent environmental standards. The Geelong community currently pays $1 million per year in State Government landfill levies, but with recent changes to legislation, this will increase to $3 million over the next five years if current waste volumes continue. If we keep going the way we have been, in ten years time we will be paying between $50 to $60 per tonne, and that's before inflation.  The City of Greater Geelong will run out of space at its current landfill sites if we don't reduce our annual garbage pile.

Establishing a new landfill site would cost between $5 to $6 million and that's assuming a suitable site could ever be found. After all, would you like a new tip in your suburb? Our old landfill sites will also require $11 million to rehabiltate.

How to save on garbage

We don't have to keep paying so much for our garbage. Reducing the amount of garbage that ends up in landfill will ultimately reduce the overall cost of garbage to the community. And it's easy to do. The City of Greater Geelong's three-bin recycling and waste collection system gives everyone the opportunity to recycle, reuse and reduce. Recyclable materials and garden waste can now be easily separated, ready for kerb side collection.

Green waste saves money

Green waste currently costs around $27 per tonne to turn into compost and mulch. Compared to $35 per tonne to bury our general waste. With increased environmental requirements this will soon increase to some $60 per tonne. Since 30% of Geelong's landfill is currently made up of green waste, your green waste bin is a powerful weapon in the fight to reduce the cost of garbage.

Reduced energy consumption

Recycling plastic drink bottles takes 84% less energy than it takes to make plastic bottles from the raw materials. The source materials for most plastics are fossil fuels like crude oil, gas and coal. Making new aluminium cans from recycled cans uses only 5% of the energy required to make cans from the raw materials. Less energy during manufacture keeps down the purchase price and reduces demand on finite energy reserves.

Reduced ore consumption

Recycling enables manufacturers to create new products from materials already converted from a raw state. Creating new aluminium cans from recycled aluminium cans means that there is less demand on bauxite reserves - the base ore used to make aluminium. Reduced demand for raw materials ensures that existing reserves last longer.