Waste

Mixed waste at landfill tip face Waste is much more than just the rubbish or garbage found in a bin. Anything no longer used or wanted and is discarded is waste.

About waste

All societies produce waste. In ancient times waste could have been animal bones or broken tools, today it could be a plastic bag or a mobile phone. Archaeologists and other scientists can learn a lot about earlier civilizations by studying the waste left behind.

In the early 20th century, waste was dumped in the bush, in wetlands and in creeks and gullies; in some cities, waste was loaded onto boats and dumped at sea. In 1900, rats attracted to piles of garbage helped spread an outbreak of bubonic plague in Sydney.

Today most of the waste we produce ends up in specially designed dumps, called landfills, where it can be safely contained and managed to prevent impacts on the environment and human health. However, landfills are expensive to build and manage and with Australians creating more and more waste, we need to find ways to reduce the amount of waste we produce.

What is waste?

Did you know?

Every Australian produces around 606 kilograms of municipal waste(waste generated in households) each year; which places us as the 10th highest waste generator per person in the world when compared with other countries. The USA is the leader with a reported 926kg municipal waste/capita generated each year. (Source: Waste and Recycling in Australia, 2009)
Over three million tonnes of municipal waste was collected in Queensland in 2006 to 2007. (Source: Waste and Recycling in Australia, 2009)
The Fresh Kills landfill in New York is the world’s largest landfill and is visible from space. It is approximately the same size as Uluru.
Remember waste doesn't just come from the home, it is produced by industry, shops and offices, mines and farms - all this waste needs to be collected and if it can't be recycled or reused most of it will end up in a landfill.

Managing waste

Australia is producing much more waste than it was 50 years ago. This increase is due to a number of technological and lifestyle changes including:

greater use of plastic as a packaging material; plastic is a flexible and useful material, however plastic packaging has replaced materials that were biodegradable or more readily reusable or recyclable
people eat more takeaway food, producing waste such as plastic cutlery, cups and containers
greater production and popularity of disposable or single use items such as cups and razors

Waste on the Gold Coast

Every week each household on the Gold Coast places around 22 kilograms of waste materials into the recycling or waste wheelie bin for kerbside collection.

Waste audits carried out on the Gold Coast in 2010 (an audit sorts, classifies and weighs the waste from households) reveals exactly how much and what type of waste people produce. The diagram below shows the proportions of the waste placed into household garbage bins each week. percentages of material in household waste bin

Green waste 29%
Food waste 25%
Plastics 14%
Paper & cardboard 12%
Glass 3%
Metals 4%
The rest (nappies, shoes, clothes, wood etc.) 13%

You can download a fact sheet with more detail: What's in your bin? (1.1MB)

There are five landfills on the Gold Coast - at Molendinar, Reedy Creek, Stapylton, Suntown and Tugun. All the waste from household wheelie bins goes to the Stapylton landfill; the other landfills are for commercial and other non-putrescible wastes.

Gold Coast landfills are designed and managed under guidelines set down by the Queensland Department of Environment and Resource Management (DERM). Landfills are lined with clay and special materials called geotextiles to prevent leachate (liquid made up of rainwater and fluids from decomposing materials) leaking into the surrounding environment.

Once buried waste breaks down anaerobically, (without oxygen) and produces gas. Landfill gases such as carbon dioxide and methane are greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases prevent some of the sun's heat escaping into space and help to keep our planet warm. Many scientists believe that increased production of greenhouse gases is making the earth hotter - global warming.

Gold Coast City Council turning landfill gas into energy

Even though the waste that goes to landfill cannot be recycled, it can be beneficial to the environment by producing renewable energy. Waste in landfills decomposes or rots and produces biogas - which is mostly methane. The biogas is captured in pipes placed in the landfill, cleaned and then burned. The energy produced when the gas is burned turns a turbine that produces electricity.

Gold Coast City Council and Energex are extracting and converting biogas from four of the Gold Coast's landfills. Between 2004 and 2008, gas recovered from these landfills produced approximately 66,000 megawatt hours of power - enough electricity to power nearly 7,300 homes for a year. Using electricity from landfill gas prevents the gases from escaping into the atmosphere and reduces the need to burn coal or other fossil fuels that produce more greenhouse gases.

Reducing waste at school

We need to produce less waste; recycling is a good start but we can all do more. One of the best ways is to shop smarter by remembering the three R's - reduce, reuse and recycle. You can practice the three R's by packing a low waste lunch, check out our tips.

Buy large bags of lunch box items like chips, sultanas or crackers and pack them into a plastic container for lunch.
Buy lunch box fruit fresh and loose, not on a plastic tray wrapped in plastic wrap or in a plastic container.
Buy a reusable lunch box and drink bottle.
Try to pack less snack packs (cheese and dip, yoghurt and sprinkles) they produce multiple litter items.
Choose lunch box items that can be recycled, like plastic soft drink bottles, poppers and steel and aluminium cans.

For more information on reducing litter at your school, go to the Litter-free schools pages.

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