Wokingham

The roots of the Wokingham district’s green waste scheme look set to spread even further as Wokingham District Council’s decision-making executive considers proposals to expand the scheme to a further 30,000 properties.

At their meeting on Thursday September 28, members of the executive will consider proposals to extend the scheme using a DEFRA (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) grant, bringing the total number of households able to take part to 50,000. Having met its government-set recycling and composting target of 30% of household waste for 2005/6, the council is looking at ways to increase this still further.

The scheme allows Wokingham residents to put their green garden waste out for collection in a large reusable green sack (provided by the council). This garden waste is then collected every fortnight, on the same day as their normal household rubbish and on the alternate week to their black box recycling collection.

In order to improve the district’s already excellent recycling levels and to meet the government’s increasingly stringent targets, the Wokingham council had to look at additional options to the popular kerbside recycling scheme already in place and garden waste was identified as the material that could potentially contribute most to this target. The pilot green waste scheme was introduced in April 2005 and rolled out from an original 10,000 properties to the 20,000 properties now eligible to take part in the scheme. In its first year, the scheme saw just over 1,000 tonnes of green waste collected.

Should the executive give the proposals to expand the scheme the green light, the DEFRA grant of £328,000 would allow Wokingham council to purchase a third vehicle to collect the green waste, allowing the scheme to be extended to further properties. The extension to the scheme would take place in two phases - November 2006 and April 2007.

In November, the areas (all or part of) which are likely to benefit from the proposed extension to the scheme are: Earley, Finchampstead, Shinfield, Sonning, Twyford, Wokingham, Wokingham Without and Woodley.

It is then proposed that in April 2007 the scheme expand to all or parts of the following: Earley, Hurst, Winnersh, Wokingham and Woodley.

Executive member for environment services Cllr Simon Weeks said: “Many residents of the Wokingham district are already very enthusiastic in their recycling and the council wants to do what it can to help them. Adding garden waste to our collection scheme allows households to divert even more of their waste away from ever diminishing landfill space.

“I hope that the executive will agree to this substantial extension of the scheme to allow us to improve on our already impressive recycling record. I know residents are keen to help us grow our composting figures and will take advantage of the extended scheme.”

Those Wokingham households in areas not taking part in the scheme will still be able to have one black sack of garden waste per property collected free of charge each week. Alternatively, residents not taking part in the scheme can purchase blue garden waste sacks from the council at a cost of £1 each. The council also encourages people to home compost – more details are available by calling 0845 130 6090. Garden waste can also be taken to the civic amenity sites in Bracknell and Reading for composting.

The council’s waste team is happy to answer any queries on the green waste scheme and can be contacted on (0118) 974 6307.
Wokingham District Council