Food waste rollout almost complete
All homes in Portsmouth will get caddies by this summer
Food waste collections will be extended to the remaining homes in Portsmouth by the summer, completing the roll-out of the service by the city council.
Communal properties, including flats and HMOs, had been left out of the first phases of the scheme but the first of these are now being given food waste caddies in a bid to improve recycling rates.
Cabinet member for environment, councillor Kimberly Barrett said completing the roll-out of the service supported the council’s aim to reduce the amount of waste it is disposing of.
‘About 40 per cent of the rubbish collected in Portsmouth is food waste so providing a separate food waste collection service will reduce the amount of rubbish being sent for incineration and will help Portsmouth become a greener city,’ she said.
Work to roll out the service to communal homes began in February and is expected to be completed by the summer. Every house in the city will then be covered.
Each household will be provided with a food waste caddy which can be emptied in larger communal bins available at each building.
Waste than can be disposed of includes food, tea bags, coffee grounds, shredded paper and cut flowers.
The council said almost 6,600 tonnes of food waste had been collected from Portsmouth homes since it first started collections in September 2019.
Collected waste is sent to anaerobic digesters where it is turned into biogas for use as fuel
Due to the lack of a digester in Portsmouth, waste collected in the city is sent to a plant near Bournemouth. However, the city council is hoping to build its own in the next few years.
A feasibility case was written in 2019 to build the facility on a site that has yet to be made public, working with both Southampton and Hampshire councils to enable a county-wide service to be provided.
A cabinet report published on Tuesday says a planning application is expected to be submitted in the summer with the aim of having approval in place next year.