Council's sustainable waste management strategy

The policies of our Waste Strategy are based on the eight key principles below:

• The waste heirarchy
• The best practical environmental option
• The proximity principle
• The self sufficiency principle
• The sustainable principle
• The principle of best value
• Environmental management
• A precautionary principle

The Waste Strategy aims to ensure that we comply with waste management legislation and meet its statutory targets and exceeds them where practical considerations and resources allow. Waste prevention and minimisation is the first priority of the Waste Strategy.

We have signed up to an aspirational target of 'zero waste' disposed of directly to landfill. By formally agreeing and adopting this Waste Management Strategy, we are committed to working together in partnership to deliver it. Progress will be reviewed biannually by key stakeholders (users of the services) with a full review of the Waste Strategy every five years.

Why is the Waste Management Strategy necessary?

The majority of waste or rubbish produced in Lewes district (and in the UK) is disposed of to landfill sites. In the operational year 2004-5 our recycling rate was 17.72% (5500 tonnes) of the household wasste collected. A further 10.2% was diverted from landfill (home composting etc). The remaining waste was landfilled, which means that we disposed of approximately 25,000 tonnes of household waste in 2004-5 by burying it in the ground (excluding waste in Household Waste Recycling Sites operated by East Sussex County Council).

We cannot continue to landfill the majority of our waste as we have in the past. Landfilling rubbish is not sustainable because by disposing of our rubbish to landfill, the opportunity to utilise large proportions of the waste as a secondary resource is missed. Landfill sites use up land which is valuable, not infinitely available and full of natural resources such as wildlife.

Eventually we will run out of suitable landfill sites. In addition the European Commission's Landfill Directive places limits on the amount of biodegradable municipal waste that can be landfilled in the future.

Municipal waste, which includes household rubbish, is only approximately 12% of the total waste produced annually in Lewes district. The remaining waste is commercail and industrial, special and inert/ construction and demolition waste. This strategy document is focused on domestic municipal waste because this waste is in the direct control of the Council and it is the waste that the UK Government has set statutory targets for.

The Waste Heirarchy

An internationally accepted principle shows the best through to the worst ways of dealing with waste. Preventing waste is the first priority, then reusing it, then recycling or composting it and only then considering disposal as the final option.

Thinking of waste as a resource will help to ensure that the waste heirarchy is successfully implemented.

For more detailed information about our Sustainable Waste Management Strategy the relevant documents can be downloaded from that section at the bottom of this page.