For most households, thoughts of rubbish end when we wheel our bins out to the kerb on bin day, but what happens after that?

To find out, Orange City Life joined last week’s tour of the Ophir Road and Euchareena Road Resource Recovery Centres, which were conducted by Envirocom Australia.

Recyclables

While the recyclables journey is an interesting one, for Orange it largely takes place outside the region and outside scope of the local tour. Recyclables are collected from the kerbside in our yellow lidded bins as well as being dropped off in the marked bays at the Ophir Road Recovery Centre (which can be done anytime for free in case you weren’t aware). Twice daily, recyclables are trucked off to a Materials Recovery Facility in Smithfield where paper, cardboard and plastics are sorted and reclaimed for recycling.  According to JR Richards & Sons — who manage the waste collection for Orange and over 20 other Councils — 75,000 tonnes of materials are recovered through their facilities each year!

Scrap metal can also be dropped off at no cost at the recovery centre, where it is collected by Sims Metals.

The Ophir Road Recovery Centre is also where residents can drop off problem wastes such as paints, oils, gas bottles, smoke detectors, e-waste and batteries. Again, there is no charge and these items are then transported to a facility in Sydney for further processing.

General Waste

At the Ophir Road Recovery Centre, the tour takes us past the Recycling Transfer Building to ‘the baler’. It is a unique feature of Orange’s waste management that general waste collected from the red-lidded bins and dropped off at the recovery centre is pressed into bales and completely wrapped in plastic before being placed in landfill.

The 1.5 metre compacted waste cubes can weigh between 800-1500 kilograms each, depending on what they consist of. The neatly-wrapped compacted bales save a significant amount of space in the landfill, which greatly extends the life of each cell. It also greatly reduces the amount of windblown rubbish, which is a problem that plagues landfills the world over.

Around 100 bales of waste are pressed each day and trucked off to landfill, but that number could be far less if people were more diligent in keeping recyclables and food waste out of their red bins.

Each year, Envirocom conduct an audit of our city’s waste, sorting through a sample of several tonnes to see just what it getting put into the waste stream. The last audit, completed in August, found that only 61 per cent of the mass going to landfill is general waste, with 21 per cent being recyclables and 18 per cent food waste.

The landfill site is located on the Euchareena Road outside of Molong and has been operating since 2012. Compared to other landfills I have seen, it is a rather neat operation and Jo, our guide, tells us that it is held up as an example of a world-class landfill. The plastic wrapped cubes of waste are stacked like blocks in the plastic-lined cells to catch any leachate and then covered with dirt as each layer is filled. When built, the landfill was estimated to have a lifespans of 40 years, but that could be extended if we can learn to keep food waste and recyclables out of the waste stream.

Composting

Orange’s composting plant is another unique feature of our waste management. In a large shed at the Euchareena Road Resource Recovery Centre, food scraps and garden waste put into the green-lid bins are converted into high-grade compost.

The journey starts back at Ophir Road, where the organic waste collected from the green bins is combined with grass clippings and tree prunings dropped off at the facility and then shredded before being transported to the composting plant.

The composting takes place in four tunnels. Each is loaded with up to 250 tonnes of organic waste, then water and air controlled to begin the composting process. The piles can heat up to 75 degrees, which kills any pathogens, insects and weed seeds. After two weeks in the tunnels, the compost is moved and placed in windrows to further mature.

Finally, the finished compost is screen to 16mm, removing any course material. The compost, which is actually a certified organic product, is then sold to farmers and local gardeners from the Ophir Road facility.

 Make the most of your green bin!

Getting food waste out of the red and into the green bins is priority here in Orange, said Envirocom environmental consultant and tour operator, Jo Smith.

The controlled composting of organic waste means that pretty much any organic item can be placed in the green bins from garden waste to meat, bones, and soiled waste paper.

“We are really focused on getting food into the green bin here in Orange,” said Jo. “We have this service available — most other places just have that garden waste in the green bin — but the fact that we can put food in there and we can find a better way to dispose of it and turn it into compost… we should really be utilizing that.”

Keeping food out of the red bins not only extends the life of the landfill, but greatly improves the quality of the compost made and creates a product that is in high demand from local farmers. It also reduces methane emissions and the amount of leachate that is produced.

“It extends the life of the landfill and produces compost that we use on local vineyards, farms and people can buy it for their gardens— it is a win-win!

“I think we really need to be embracing it wholeheartedly.”