It is time we start taking responsibility for our own waste and working out ways to re-use it. With this in mind Lismore City Council has just opened a new $2.5 million commercial waste sorting facility.
The new commercial waste sorting facility at the Lismore Recycling & Recovery centre will help divert up to 10,000 tonnes of waste from landfill and create around ten full-time jobs.
The commercial waste sorting facility was opened yesterday by Lismore Mayor Isaac Smith and Lismore MP Thomas George.
Diverting construction waste away from landfill
The facility uses both mechanical and manual sorting techniques to separate incoming construction and demolition waste and commercial and industrial waste, much of which has traditionally been sent to landfill. Council can now better sort materials such as concrete and steel and divert these from landfill.
The facility will create between eight and 11 jobs including positions for workers from the House With No Steps, a supported employment provider based in Alstonville. Employees from the organisation have been sorting recyclables in the adjacent Materials Recovery Facility since it opened in 2014 and the new facility will allow Council to expand this social enterprise.
‘This new facility will assist Council to meet the NSW Government targets for waste diversion which are set at 75 per cent diversion for construction and demolition waste, and 70 per cent for commercial and industrial waste,’ Lismore Mayor Isaac Smith said.
‘It will also extend the life of our current landfill cell and provide local people with employment.
‘We currently landfill around 18,000 tonne of commercial and industrial and self-haul municipal waste. This new facility will provide a regional hub for the recycling of commercial waste and we estimate we will divert around 10,000 tonnes of waste per annum from landfill, which is a staggering amount.’
This project was supported by the Environmental Trust as part of the NSW Environmental Protection Authority’s Waste Less, Recycle More initiative, funded from the waste levy.
