A study of best practice principles on which to base interventions used to improve municipal material recycling rates achieved by English local authorities

Lee, Sheryl Ann (2022) A study of best practice principles on which to base interventions used to improve municipal material recycling rates achieved by English local authorities. Doctoral thesis (PhD), Manchester Metropolitan University.

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Abstract

Municipal waste management in England has changed beyond recognition in the last 30 years. In response to legislative requirements to reduce the amount of waste going to landfill and to recycle material, English Local Authorities (LA) have moved from a predominantly linear waste management model that used landfill for disposal, to a sophisticated network of treatment facilities that separate and prepare materials for recycling, closing the loop on material markets and feeding into the circular economy. Recently, however, England’s recycling performance has stagnated, even declining in some areas, and with a backdrop of budget cuts, increasing targets to divert waste from landfill and to increase recycling performance, LAs face a huge task to meet these demands. Presently, it is estimated that 26% of material that is placed in the residual waste bin is recyclable, so there is material in the system to further enhance recycling levels, the question is whether LAs will be able to nudge closer to these targets within the current system. The variable performance between LAs suggests that there is capacity to do this, with a 44% difference in recycling rates between the best and poorest performing LAs in England. This study aimed to understand what is responsible for this difference and to extract best practice on which to base intervention tools designed to enhance public participation in recycling to achieve the more consistent level of material recovery across LAs required to meet future national targets. Using geo-socio-economic characteristics English LAs were placed into 6 groups of commonality intended to remove the influence of factors outside of the LA’s control, such as the demography and rurality of an area. The LAs were then ranked in order of recycling performance, based on both the quantity and quality of material collected. This demonstrated a range of LA performance in each group, from which examples of the better and poorer performing LAs were chosen for in-depth analysis; exploring the core attributes and identifying the best practices that explain the difference in performance. The findings confirm the known influence of geo-socio-economic factors on performance; recycling positively related to increasing affluence and rurality. However, inter-group comparisons revealed that education appears to be as important as infrastructure and service delivery in influencing recycling performance and has yet generally suffered from dis-investment as a result of austerity measures. In cases where LAs managed to retain budget commitments for providing continual education, these were rewarded by an increase in the income received from increased recyclate tonnages and from the substantial savings made from reducing contaminated loads being rejected and sent for disposal. These findings imply that education budgets need to be increased and protected if English LAs are to maximise the recycling performance possible from existing infrastructure; thereby optimising environmental and economic returns and standing a chance of meeting future recycling targets. The key outcomes of the study include. • Education, especially face to face communication, appears to be as important as infrastructure and service delivery in influencing recycling performance. • Increasing and protecting education budgets is necessary for LAs to maximise their recycling performance using current infrastructure. • Confirmation of the influence GSE factors have on recycling performance and the positive relationship between quantity and quality of recyclate. • Unintended consequences from policy changes such as material light weighting are having a negative impact on LAs. • Lack of downstream infrastructure could inhibit standardised waste collection schemes throughout England.