www.insidewaste.com.au
ISSUE 109 | AUG/SEP 2022
INSIDE 34 40 45
Carbon capture Legislation cohesion Consultant’s review
Why advanced recycling matters
When disaster strikes who takes charge of the clean-up? traumatic as the event itself. At the Coffs Harbour Waste 2022 conference a panel discussed the issues surrounding waste once a natural disaster has occurred. There are many organisations – both government and private – that help with a clean-up once the emergency has passed. Arminda Ryan is the NSW EPA’s director of incident management and environment health. Ryan has spent the past couple of years as an incident co-ordinator helping environmental services clean up after flood and bushfire events. Over that time the process has been streamlined and she offered her insight into how the recovery processes in place have worked recently. “From my observations, unfortunately, we’re actually getting quicker in dealing with the aftermath of these events,” she said. “And I say unfortunately, because
the reason we’re doing better is because we’ve had so much practice doing the clean-up recently we’re getting more efficient and effective at doing it.” And not all clean-ups are created equal. In the case of bushfires, the NSW EPA appoints a lead contractor, Laing O’Rourke, who manages all the subcontractors. For floods, the clean-up is run by NSW Public Works department, which ironically was to be represented on the panel but was too busy cleaning up the flooding in the Northern Rivers region of NSW. When it comes to collecting the waste and disposing of it, there are a myriad of issues that need to be dealt with from a logistics point of view. How much is there to clean up? Where is it sorted? Can the local landfills take the thousands of tonnes of debris generated by the event? (Continued on page 22)
PP: 100024538
ISSN 1837-5618
ACCORDING to the United Nation’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the number of natural disasters around the world has increased by a factor of five over the past 50 years. The organisation’s Atlas of Mortality and Economic Losses from Weather, Climate and Water Extremes (1970-2019) states there have been more than 11,000 natural disasters over that time period. More than two million people have lost their lives as a result, while there has been more than US$3.6 trillion in monetary losses. Australia has had its fair share of disasters, especially when it comes to flooding and bushfires. Then there is drought and the occasional tropical cyclone in the northern climes of the country. These disasters have been devastating to those who have been at the sharp end of nature’s wrath, while the clean-up process can be almost as
ADVANCED recycling is a buzzword that is becoming part of the narrative of the waste industry, and one that had a whole session dedicated to it at this year’s Waste Expo in Coffs Harbour. A panel discussion, chaired by the Australian Food & Grocery Council’s (AFGC) sustainability manager Barry Cosier, took a deep dive into what advanced recycling is, and what impact it can have on the industry. “The AFGC has been awarded a grant from the government and we’re creating the national plastics recycling scheme to recycle a targeted 190,000 tonnes of soft plastics,” said Cosier. “If those who aren’t aware, a third of all plastic packaging is soft plastics, and it has a recycling rate of about six per cent so it’s a really big problem. But what we want to do is make sure we create a scheme that has a market. Today, we’re going to hear from the whole supply chain.” Dr Sarah King has a PhD in the circular economy and works as a senior research consultant on the subject at the CSIRO. Her accomplishments include being integral to the development of Aspire, a matchmaking marketplace for the circular economy; and she was also part of the team that delivered the CSIRO Circular Economy Roadmap. When King was looking into the roadmap as it related to plastics and recycling she realised that there was not enough room in that report to cover off on advanced recycling. (Continued on page 26)
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