In 2012, three councils in the Cheshire region – Ellesmere Port and Neston Borough Council, Vale Royal Borough Council, and Chester City Council – merged into a new council: Chester West and Chester Council. Following the announcement of the structural change, the council had put out its waste collection and recycling services for tender, stating that the successful bidder should harmonise the three current systems into one and, in doing so, raise recycling rates. The winning tender for the 14-year contract (with the option to extend by a further seven) was from May Gurney (now owned by Kier), which reportedly “won out on quality and price”. The company was awarded the contract to run a kerbside sort programme in 2011. “We had an open mind to what the solution might be”, says Steve Bakewell, Senior Manager for Waste Collection & Disposal at Cheshire West and Chester Council. “It could have been either co-mingled or kerbside sort, as we were operating both systems over the three councils; roughly two-thirds were on kerbside sort, with those in the Chester area on a co-mingled service. In the end, Kier’s two-box system was successful in winning the tender, and we expect it will save us £75 million over the life of the contract.” Cheshire West and Chester Council’s collection system now involves fortnightly collections of residual waste (in 180-litre bins) alongside a weekly recycling system of a food waste caddy combined with two 55-litre lidded boxes: one for plastic and cans and another for all other dry recyclables (including glass, paper, textiles, small WEEE, spectacles, etc.). All the recyclables (including food waste) are then sorted at the kerbside into a multi- compartment vehicle by the recycling operatives. Free fortnightly green waste collections are also provided. “We’re supporters of kerbside sort because of the quality of materials that we get out of the system, and because it enforces behavioural change”, Bakewell explains. “If there is any contamination, such as materials put in the wrong boxes, or people putting non- recyclables in the boxes, we can leave that behind with a message in the box stating why we have done so. With the old co-mingling service in Chester, contaminants were not found until they got to the MRF, and there was no way of specifically identifying and targeting the people that had put the contaminants in the bin in the first place. That caused a problem, as the resident saw that the bin had been emptied and therefore continued to try and recycle non-recyclable materials.” Bakewell reveals that the new system has not only largely eliminated contamination, it has also helped boost recycling rates (which are estimated to have reached 58.5 per cent this year) and proven very popular with residents. Although the council has not yet undertaken a TEEP test for its service (Bakewell said that the onus is on Kier to work with the council rather than the other way round, as per contractual requirements), he believes that the council’s collection system is “very low-risk”. He says: “We’re already quite compliant as we separate out the target materials and produce high-quality recyclate. The biggest thing for us is quality, really. Reprocessors look for high-quality materials, and those high-quality materials tend to come from kerbside sort schemes. We know from our experience with Chester’s old co-mingling scheme that paper can be contaminated with glass in co-mingled collections and that glass is sometimes not good enough quality to go for remelting, closed-loop applications. “So, we think separate sort is the best way forward for recyclate quality and in terms of behavioural change. Yes, it takes more effort than co-mingling, but as we’ve proved with our scheme, the rewards are there if you chip away over a number of years to get the public on board.”

Find out more about the separate collections vs. co-mingled collections debate, or take a look at our case study on co-mingled collections.