The Public Relations Fight-back from the Waste Industry!

Link to Proteus (PDF document)

"A specialist environmental communications 

and issues management consultancy"

"MICHAEL BUERK. Tony Robinson. Stephen Fry. All TV personalities. All intellects (Baldrick aside). All trusted by the public. And, as such, all perfect to lead a pro-incineration campaign.

"At least that was the idea touted by one of the government’s most trusted PR agencies last year: Munro & Foster’s brief was to show how the public could be convinced that energy from waste (to use the correct terminology) was an essential part of the UK’s waste reduction mix. Unfortunately, Friends of the Earth (FoE) got hold of the agency’s presentation, and gave it to the press; the ideas were quickly buried deep within Defra HQ (or perhaps burnt?). The incident was unfortunate – not just for red-faced government officials, but for the waste industry generally.

"FoE, meanwhile, has been instrumental in mobilising UKWin (UK Without incineration) with the tools to bring many waste infrastructure plans to a stuttering halt. So, what can the waste industry do to overcome the protesters? And, more importantly, what can they learn from them?"

Wastewatch video in west London

"Waste Watch is a practical charity inspiring and helping people to waste less. No-one likes waste. No-one wants waste. So we help people waste less. For us, it’s about showing what we can all do to change the way we produce, buy, use and dispose of things.

"Our vision is a world where we use resources effectively, live sustainably and make a positive contribution to the environment."

Link to 'Wastewatch' web site

The Guardian: " 'I'm-happy-I'm-green' consensus won't placate our lust for novelty"

Link to The Guardian

"A whole range of sciences is telling us that our high-consumption economies are structured to satisfy only one half of our nature (the selfish, novelty-seeking part). Shouldn't we rearrange things to cater to the other half (altruistic and tradition-loving)?

"Humans truly thrive when they are able to act freely, to master skills they choose to master, and can take non-fatal risks under conditions of ultimate security. A green politics has to be thinking passionately about zones of creativity and innovation for human beings, as well as the constraints and duties of low-carbon living. Otherwise the transforming dimension of our own nature will end up repressed and frustrated."

Edgelands: "Wilderness that is much closer than you think"

BBC iPlayer, week of 15 April 2011

Author: Michael Symmons Roberts, Paul Farley

Format: Hardback

ISBN: 9780224089029

Published: 17 February 2011

Publisher: Jonathan Cape Ltd

"Edgelands explores a wilderness that is much closer than you think: a debatable zone, neither the city nor the countryside, but a place in-between - so familiar it is never seen for looking. Passed through, negotiated, unnamed, ignored, the edgelands have become the great wild places on our doorsteps, places so difficult to acknowledge they barely exist.

"Edgelands forms a critique of what we value as 'wild', and allows our allotments, railways, motorways, wasteland and water a presence in the world, and a strange beauty all of their own. Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts - both well-known poets - have lived and worked and known these places all their lives, and in Edgelands their journeying prose fuses, in the anonymous tradition, to allow this in-between world to speak up for itself.

"They write about mobile masts and gravel pits, business parks and landfill sites in the same way the Romantic writers forged a way of looking at an overlooked - but now familiar - landscape of hills and lakes and rivers. England, the first country to industrialise, now offers the world's most mature post-industrial terrain, and is still in a state of flux: Edgelands takes the reader on a journey through its forgotten spaces, so that we can marvel at this richly mysterious, cheek-by-jowl region in our midst."

60-year anniversary of the 'Festival of Britain'

Link to video of 'The Observer' film: 'Brief City' (1952)

"It may have taught the men who are building our cities something. It may have given an impetus to a new approach to building, here in Britain. But for ordinary people, it was fun."

Link to 'The Guardian'

"The Festival of Britain is remembered as an uplifting moment for a nation recovering from war. Iain Sinclair, who visited it aged eight, reflects on the celebrations to mark its 60th anniversary, in our age of corporate sponsorship and Olympics mania.

"The documentary Brief City' brought the Festival of Britain right back to me. The voice-over speaks of 'fierce little boys filled with their secret purposes'. School caps, ties, white shirts, grey shorts. The men are layered in gabardine, puffing on pipes. The women carry large white bags, as they hobble in difficult shoes.

Awkward youths, not yet assigned as teenagers, sport uniform, open-neck shirts, under blazers with badges. They peer intently at pistons and cogs, operated by boffins who wear greasy ties, under long, brown lab coats. This was a festival of doleful enlightenment, self-improving recreation."

Friends of the Earth: Reducing waste, and boosting recycling and reuse

And the web site.

Myth and Reality in Lancashire

Link to 'Global Renewables' web site

"In March 2007, Global Renewables Lancashire Ltd, Lancashire County Council and Blackpool Council signed a £2billion, 25-year agreement, to process the household waste of 1.4m people in Lancashire.

"From the moment of delivery, every aspect of the Farington facility takes place indoors, making it the UK’s first fully enclosed waste treatment facility. ... Every part of the process is connected to the air management system, which has been designed so that fresh air is constantly being sucked into the building. Therefore, when the doors are opened briefly to allow trucks access, air flows in, not out, owing to the fact that there is a slightly lower air pressure inside the building."

Link to 'Leyland Guardian' web site

Residents’ fury at ‘broken promises’ of waste firm

"More than 70 people vented their anger about the Farington Waste Recovery Park, which they blame for producing awful smells and plumes of steam, at a meeting on Monday.

"Resident Pauline Clarke said: 'It smells like a swamp, and it’s on my curtains, my bedding, my hair. It’s vile.'

"Colin Bell said: 'I think it’s in the wrong place. It’s too close to houses, and now we’ve got trouble with these terrible smells. I thought it was the drains at first.' "

"Major study into incinerator impact on infant mortality rate set to get started"

Link to further information on 'writemark' blog

"The Health Protection Agency [HPA] is set to make good on a 2003 promise by former chief executive Pat Troop to undertake a study into the long-term health effects of chemical exposure from landfill sites and incinerators.

"Critics have argued that it's not the microscopic particles emitted by incinerators that kill youngsters in these areas, but poverty. It's certainly true that inhabitants of many of the areas in which incinerators are sited are at the lower end of the social scale but Shrewsbury resident Michael Ryan's 'trick' is to show that the death rates in 'middle class’ areas are higher if there's an incinerator lurking in the background.

"Chingford Green Ward is an affluent area of Waltham Forest, and yet it has the second highest average number of child deaths at in the whole of London. It just happens to be close to Britain’s largest incinerator, at Edmonton."

"66% of the residual waste CAN be recycled, so that 90% recycling rate should be possible”

Link to short press release

Link to 'Waste in Wales'

Jane Davidson Environment Minister for the Welsh Assembly Government said:

"My ambition is for Wales to recycle 70% of its waste by 2025, and be zero waste by 2050."

Friends of the Earth: "Talking half as much rubbish"

Link to 'Friends of the Earth'

"We need to show that the majority of people want to throw away less rubbish, and have more and better recycling services instead.

Join Friends of the Earth's campaign for a goal to:

'halve household black-bag waste
by 2020'.

To paraphrase Monty Python, ...

Do you want the thirty seconds of Filthy London...

Or the full one hour?

(Click above for BBC web site)

10.30am, Saturday 16 April (free) seminar: Avoid the NEED for Incinerators - 'Moving towards Zero Waste'!

Click above to enlarge
(map)

"The 'Zero Waste Alliance UK' aims to protect, preserve, and improve the environment, for the benefit of the public, by the development, provision, and promotion of sustainable waste management practices. It also seeks to educate the public in all matters relating to this.

"Sustainable waste management practices include:

• waste minimisation, 
• minimisation of pollution and harm from waste, 
• reuse of waste, recycling of waste, 
• waste recovery activities, and 
• recovery of pollutants from contaminated land,

in accordance with 'Waste Strategy for England' 2007 [now being revised].

"We seek a better environment by encouraging a cleaner and healthier way of dealing with waste issues."

Willesden & Brent Times (7 April)

(Click to enlarge, and possibly again to magnify)

Willesden & Brent Times (31 March)

A spot of bother around the North Circular

'The Independent': "The threat to wildlife from debris floating in our seas"

Link to 'The Independent'

"Humans currently produce 260 million tons of plastic a year. When pulled into the sea's currents, plastics do not biodegrade, but are broken into smaller pieces which are consumed by marine life."

"The biggest rubbish 'swill' is the North Pacific Gyre, the 'great garbage patch' the size of Texas, and containing an estimated 3.5 million items of detritus, ranging from toys to toothbrushes."

'Sustainable Cities': "Copenhagen is no longer using landfills as a general solution to its waste problem"

Link to web site

"Waste is better utilised through incineration than through landfills, but recy­cling is an even better option.

"Of course, the best option is prevention of waste production altogether, which often requires direct reuse. The less waste, the better – it’s as simple as that."  

- 'Copenhagen Waste Solution', City of Copenhagen (2008)

---

[We say: Incineration is a waste of resources, especially of plastics, and stops higher recycling rates - do not choose to build incinerators!]

Er, are we being stitched up, after all?

This email today suggests that SITES are rather more important than POLICIES...

Thank you for taking the time to write to us with your views on the West London Waste Plan. We will consider all the views submitted, during the preparation of the next stage of the Plan. A report on all the consultation responses received will be prepared by CAG Consultants, and will be available towards the end of May or during June. This document will be available online at www.wlwp.net and on request from your local borough Council.

The next stage is to agree a final version of the Plan, which will include a revised list of sites, taking account of all the consultation comments. It is intended to publish this later this year, at which time you will be contacted, and given a further opportunity to comment. Please check the website for regular updates on the Plan's development.

Kind regards,

Rachel Crozier

Associate, CAG Consultants

81 Bradley Crescent

Bristol, BS11 9SR

Freephone: 0800 389 4276

Email: rachelcrozier@blueyonder.co.uk

'Zero Waste' in Scotland - can west London do any better?

Link to Scottish Government web site

Link to summary of plan

"... Waste prevention is defined in the 'Waste Framework Directive' as measures, taken before a substance, material or product has become waste, to reduce the quantity of waste. This includes:

• the re-use of products,
• the extension of the life-span of products,
• reductions in packaging etc;
• the adverse impacts of waste on the environment and human health; and
• the content of harmful substances in materials and products."

Below is from the Q&A page. The whole strategy seems to effectively reduce current incineration, reduce 'Energy-from-Waste' except gas from organics, and avoid the creation of residual waste incinerator fuel (as proposed for Pinkham Way). It favours waste reduction instead!

Question: "The research on landfill bans identified that out of the residual waste treatment options modelled, Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT) with output waste sent to landfill provided the highest net benefit to society. Doesn't this contradict Scottish Government's aspirations to reduce landfill to 5% by 2025?"

Answer: "The landfill bans research does indeed suggest that stabilised MBT outputs sent to landfill perform better in terms of short-term costs to society. However, the 'Zero Waste Plan' takes a wider, long-term view, in order to achieve a fundamental shift in how waste is viewed and managed in Scotland. 'Zero Waste' means making the most efficient use of resources, by minimising Scotland's demand on primary resources, and maximising the reuse, recycling and recovery of resources instead of treating them as waste. Disposing of any materials to landfill is wasteful, and should be avoided wherever possible."

---

The reality of new-style incinerators in Scotland is maybe given by the UKWIN MAP, and references shown on there.

'Zero Waste Alliance UK': "Conserve and recover resources, and not trash them by burning or burying!"

Link to web site

'Zero Waste Alliance UK' has published its response to DEFRA’s 'Call for Evidence' in relation to the Coalition Government’s Draft Structural Reform Plan.

Consultation comment from "Wembley Matters" web site

Park Royal: West London's Waste Land

Consultation closes on Friday on the draft Waste London Waste Plan. The consultation has hardly caused a ripple in Brent, with only a handful of members of the public, as distinct from potential contractors, turning up at the consultation at Bridge Park.  However the Plan may have big consequences for Brent, with unknown new processes taking place in the borough and a potential increase in heavy lorries transporting waste through the borough from the other boroughs, as you can see from the map above.

Brent already has waste sites at Abbey Road and Veolia's transfer station in Marsh Road, but additional sites are being considered in Park Royal in both the Brent and Ealing sectors. Additional facilities in Marsh Road seemed to be a favoured option, in conversation with officials at the consultation meeting.

The most troubling aspect of the plan is that the choosing of sites has been separated from the processes that will take place on them. The processes will form part of later planning applications, so we are being asked to comment about sites without knowing the repercussions in terms of emissions, health and safety and traffic.

A member of Richmond Green Party comments:

"When I asked the consultants about a missing table, describing possible waste technologies that could be deployed at the sites in question (a lot around Park Royal and none in Richmond, in fact) they repeated the mantra about the consultation being 'technology neutral', and have removed the reference to the table altogether in the online version now.

"But they didn't deny that incineration could be deployed at these sites."

In contrast with Brent, there was a well attended meeting in Ealing (Park Royal) where residents were horrified by the concentration of sites in the area.  Some residents were already upset about the 'stink' on the border with Hammersmith and Fulham from the Powerday facility.

Consultation ends on Friday March 25th at 5pm.

To comment, follow this LINK
or email consultation@wlwp.net

Report on a European meeting of NGOs: 'Towards Zero Waste'

On Monday 14 March, more than 30 people from 13 European countries – Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, UK, Czech Republic, Romania, Spain and Hungary – came together for the first time, to define a 'Zero Waste Strategy' for Europe. The event was organised by GAIA and EEB.

The Independent: "Wasted food equals 3% of greenhouse emissions in UK"

Link to The Independent

"The majority of wasted food is sent to landfills where, as it decomposes it produces methane - a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

"The U.S. EPA also highlights the environmental benefits of recycling food waste as compost including improving soil health and increasing drought resistance."

Daily Telegraph: "A global energy war looms"

Link to Telegraph

"It should indeed be possible to accommodate the rise of China and other emerging markets without exhausting resources or destroying the planet. But it’s going to require massive collective will, of a type the US and others have been unwilling to contemplate up until now."

Jeremy Warner, assistant editor of The Daily Telegraph, is one of Britain's leading business and economics commentators.

Sunday Telegraph: "A new exhibition rummages through the binbags of history. Hold your nose, and investigate..."

Link to Sunday Telegraph

"THE HISTORY of cities, this Wellcome show attests, is to a large extent the history of how to deal with dirt. The narrative of the Victorians’ protracted wrangling with the problem – and sewage was only the start: there remained the matter of household rubbish, and the overcrowding of the city’s cemeteries – now amazes by the sheer visibility of filth.

"The dust heaps of Victorian London had at least the advantage of being made up mostly of biodegradable waste, or material that could be relatively easily recycled, such as ash for brick manufacture. Modern detritus is notable for its longevity, hanging around in landfills like a vast archive of our throw-away culture."