Reduce your rubbish

The rubbish problem

In the year July 2001 - June 2002, 909,500 tonnes of waste was disposed (mainly to landfills) within the Auckland region.

This rubbish is made up of domestic rubbish, commercial/business waste, special waste (mainly treated hazardous wastes) and some waste trucked in from outside the region. This does not include waste which goes to cleanfills, or is recycled, or dealt with in other ways.

Where does all this rubbish go?

Non recyclable household waste collected at the gate goes straight to landfill.

Landfills in the Auckland region are:

• Claris Landfill, Great Barrier Island
• Greenmount Landfill, East Tamaki
• Redvale Landfill, North Shore
• Whitford Landfill, Manukau.

Why does waste matter?

Wasting resources is bad business. It costs you money and it costs the environment.

Are New Zealanders efficient and thrifty?

No! Approximately 93 percent of the materials we use never end up in saleable products at all but are discarded during the production process. Approximately 80 percent of what we produce is discarded after a single use.

New Zealand's waste problem is large and growing. For example Aucklanders are producing three times the amount of rubbish per person than we did 20 years ago.

Nationally we dispose of 3.4 million tonnes of rubbish into landfills per year. Around 282 thousand tonnes of hazardous waste is put into landfill each year.

Why aren't landfills a good way of dealing with our rubbish?

Burning rubbish isn't a solution - it pollutes the air and may release toxic substances. Composting and recycling are healthier options for you, your neighbours and the environment.

If there is no other option for dealing with our rubbish then a modern, well-designed and operated landfill is a reasonable option for managing our rubbish.

While landfills effectively contain our rubbish, did you know that:

• rubbish doesn't break down very well in a landfill. Plastic, steel, aluminium and even paper and cardboard take tens or hundreds of years to break down
• while modern landfills don't tend to cause dust or odour problems, nobody wants to live near one
• as garden rubbish and kitchen scraps break down in a landfill they produce methane. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas (20 times worse than carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas) and can reach explosive concentrations in enclosed spaces such as basements
• rainwater percolating through the landfill and the break down of garden rubbish and kitchen scraps contribute to a liquid called leachate. In old landfills, leachate can escape and contaminate surface and groundwater. In modern, well-managed landfills it costs a lot of money to collect and treat the leachate.

To find out more, check out the Ministry for the Environment's waste strategy.