A SOLAR and pedal-powered party takes place at Bristol's Create Centre on Saturday.

A SOLAR and pedal-powered party takes place at Bristol's Create Centre on Saturday.

The theme of the 'Saturday Sun-day' party is low-carbon living, and there will be a whole host of free hands-on activities, workshops and demos to get people thinking about greener living and help them to 'reduce the use'.

Bristol City Council leader, Councillor Barbara Janke, said: "To make sure we meet our ambitions to be the UK's Green Capital, we need to inspire Bristol people in their communities to make changes to the way they live their lives.

"I hope the event will help people to understand more and find creative ways of signing up to a greener lifestyle."

Children can crawl inside an enormous inflatable 'Explorer Dome' to find out all about earth. They'll also have the chance to make a solar-powered boat, create a recycled mural, and decorate their bikes with the help of local artists, ready for September's Bristol Cycle Carnival.

Story sessions and craft activities will be run throughout the day in Create's brand new library space.
Bristol City Football Club will be supporting the event and sending along a player to sign autographs and take part in some footie fun in the afternoon.

Bite-sized eco-home workshops will offer practical advice on insulating your home, choosing renewable energy and monitoring energy use.

There will also be live music and food and drink.

The Saturday Sun-day is from 10am to 5pm at Create, Smeaton Road, Spike Island, Bristol. Entry is free. To find out more, visit www.createbristol.org.

Bristol to object to Severnside mass incinerator

As Cllr Charlie Bolton reports on his blog, Bristol City Council has decided to object to the mass incinerator proposed for Severnside, S. Glos. This is great. I drafted and sent a statement (see below) for the Greens, urging the relevant Bristol City Council planning committee to send an objection to the planning application and to the application for an environmental permit to operate.

Air pollution from smoke, gases and ash from incinerators must be considered as should any heavy metals left in the ash. The cumulative air pollution impacts on people’s health, already suffering in this area, and on the health of nearby designated sites is unsustainable. S Glos should not grant planning permission and the Environment Agency should not give an operating permit to any mass incineration of waste on Severnside – this area is already heavily polluted, impacting on both human and environmental health.

Consider the effects of pollution from this area, added to the pollution already emitted, on the Severn Natura 2000 Marine site. This area was selected against rigorous scientific criteria to protect the most threatened and important species and habitats in Europe. The site is of international significance (UN RAMSAR listed, up to 100,000 birds over-winter there, Slimbridge is just upstream). It is very close to the incinerator site and is protected with tough limits for nutrient nitrogen deposition.

Because of the traffic on the M5 and the other polluting activities already in the area cumulative air pollution is already a real problem. It is our understanding that only insignificant levels of nutrient nitrogen could be permitted by the Environment Agency ie less than 1% of the critical load.

I'm opposed to mass incineration of rubbish because it encourages more waste. Incinerators need a regular feed of rubbish and authorities that have chosen incineration have correspondingly low recycling rates – this incinerator undermines waste reduction, minimisation, reuse and recycling. It offers massive over-capacity for waste facilities in Avonmouth. It runs counter to sustainable waste strategies. Contracts also tend to be very long (at least 25 years), meaning that we will have no way to adapt positively to changes in the waste make-up and volume.

In our view this mass incinerator is not part of a properly considered and appraised local/regional strategy which both acknowledges and acts on the fact that waste reduction, reuse and recycling saves far more energy than is generated by burning waste. Making fewer new things from raw materials is what makes most environmental sense because stocks of raw materials are finite. We should be doing all we can to recover and recycle valuable materials from our rubbish, rather than turn these materials into a ‘fuel’.

Incineration reduces waste to around 40% by weight, 25% by volume. It does not make waste disappear - much of the toxic ash still needs to be disposed of to hazardous landfill. Incineration does not generate renewable energy – burning plastic just substitutes one fossil fuel for another.

Two new web resources for biofuels & incineration...

From Jane Stevenson: The new "Action for Sustainable Energy in Bristol" campaign site has background info on the proposed biofuel plant in Bristol, and details of how to object to its planning application:

http://www.acseb.co.uk/

The hearing for the biofuel plant application has been moved to 24 February, so there is still some time to register your objections.

Avonmouth is under seige from a raft of planning applications - 2 biomass power stations, 1 biofuel power plant and 2 incinerators. While both incinerators are planned for Avonmouth, one falls in the Bristol authority area, and the other in South Gloucestershire. Either of them, ON THEIR OWN, would delivery more additional waste capacity in the region, than we need to process our own waste - and that's leaving aside the fact that incineration is grossly inefficient in terms of recovering the maximum amount of energy from our waste. The applications seem designed to bring imported waste into the region, from areas where they haven't got their recycling act together.

Deadlines for objections are now quite tight, and seem to be a bit of a moving target. Current advice is to get your objections registered in January.
http://www.bambi-network.org.uk/pages/youdo.php

Ask three questions, get zero answers!! A perfect combination of ignorance and dismissiveness!!

I've been investigating the environmental decision making surrounding the introduction of corn starch bags into Bristol's food waste recycling system for a while. Recently I put the three questions below to the Cabinet. I received just one response - and that did not give the information requested!

The figures given by Cllr Hopkins are certainly not carbon footprint figures and I am still looking into what they actually imply. He completely ignores my second question about other environmental impacts (carbon footprints make up less than half the total environmental impact of a product). He also completely ignores my third question which asks about economic as well as environmental assessment. Despite not backing anything he says with anything like full and accurate facts Cllr Hopkins still asserts 'this shows that there will be an overall positive impact to the environment.'!! A perfect combination of ignorance and dismissiveness.

C3. Glenn Vowles to ask Gary Hopkins, Executive Member for Environment and Community Safety

Environmental decision making and corn starch bags

In a debate on Cllr Bolton’s blog I said ‘…the decision on the [corn starch] bags has been taken without full information being sought! This is irrational. Environmental decision making should be put on a firm evidence-based process. This has not been done by any party running the council…’ to which you Cllr Hopkins replied ‘I do not base my judgements on guesses but on evidence’. My subsequent request for data on the total environmental impacts of the corn starch bags in this debate was not replied to and so I doubt that full information has in fact been sought.

Q1. What figures does the council have for the carbon footprint of these corn starch bags, in order to assess whether they more than make up for their carbon cost?

Q2. What figures does the council have for any other environmental costs the corn starch bags may have eg water footprint, land take, biodiversity impacts?

Q3. Can you outline if/how you intend to quantitatively and fully assess the net effects of corn starch bag introduction: on the environment; on the economics of waste management for Bristol?

C3. Reply:
For the plans we have regarding potential roll out of corn starch liners across Bristol, the environmental costs of liner production is summarised as:
- 45t of bags will need to divert 540t - 1125t of organic waste from landfill to make the CO2 equivalent net saving, which will require approximately 3% increase in organic recycling. This is a very realistic estimate.

In summary this shows that there will be an overall positive impact to the environment.

For clarity, this calculation does not take into account the further expected reduction in waste arisings, as previous evidence has shown that when residents start recycling food waste for the first time, they are surprised at the amount they throw away which tends to make them reduce their waste in the future.

Sustainable Communities Act successes

I'm very pleased to have received the email below today showing that two of the 22 proposals I submitted to Bristol City Council's Sustainable Communities Act process have been successful, passing the various tests (see the proposals described after the email). It will be very interesting to see what the Local Govt Association make of them.

Dear Ms White and Mr Vowles,

I'm writing to let you know that following decision at the Council's Cabinet meeting last night. I am pleased to say your joint proposal regarding reducing commercial and industrial waste and the seprate one submitted by you individally Mr Vowles on statutory biodiversity/ecofootprint data in planning applications have been submitted to the Local Government Association Selector Panel today.

We would like to thank you for your input to this process so far and will let you know as soon as we have further information from the LGA on the progress of these and other proposals the Council has submitted.

Kind regards,
Deborah

Deborah Kinghorn
Policy Officer
Deputy Chief Executive's Unit
Bristol City Council
0117 92 22792

1.The proposal is to establish statutory biodiversity/eco footprint data in planning applications.

Submission of ‘before and after’ biodiversity and eco-footprint data to be a compulsory part of all planning applications – the data to be a statutory consideration for all planning committees.

The proposal would improve the eco-footprint of new development. In theory it should lead to an increase in resource supporting biodiversity, reduce the contribution new development has on climate change, might boost the local economy through local supply, improve the resource efficiency of the development.

People submitting planning applications for new development would need guidance on how to undertake this and what would be required. Therefore Officers and Members of the Council would also need training and guidance in order to implement this proposal successfully.
It would require a change in legislation to become mandatory.

2.Reduce commercial and industrial waste.

Give local authorities the responsibility for managing all commercial and industrial waste to ensure that the principles of reduce, reuse and recycle can be applied to commercial and industrial waste as well as municipal waste.

If local authorities are given this responsibility, establish a national indicator for waste minimisation that covers commercial and municipal sectors.

Municipal waste only accounts for 15% waste and Commercial and Industrial accounts for 39% with construction and demolition 46%. (WEP Joint waste strategy paper)

There is currently little influence on the commercial and industrial sector to minimise waste through the three Rs , reduce, reuse, and recycle. The main influence is the financial cost which is not prohibitive enough to encourage minimisation of waste to landfill.

If local authorities are responsible for the whole waste stream, it will enable waste to be tackled in a more joined up way and with more regard for the environment. Commercial and Industrial waste tends to have fewer waste streams and can often be easily recycled.

Labour's Minister for the South West thinks mass incineration is green!!

Ben Bradshaw MP, Labour’s Minister for the South West expresses a very bizarre view when he says ‘By scuppering the Avonmouth plant Bristol Lib Dems and Tories have destroyed any green credibility they may have laid claim to.’ (‘They’ve destroyed any green credibility’, Open Lines, Bristol Evening Post, March 7). He calls it a ‘waste to energy plant’ when in fact what was planned was a mass incinerator designed to be fed with and burn many thousands of tonnes of waste, pumping out huge amounts of climate changing carbon emissions for several decades!

Mr Bradshaw refers to this plant as part of a strategy to meet ‘climate change and other green targets’ buts fails to mention that mass incineration is near the bottom of the list of green waste management priorities and that organisations like the Green Party, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, the Labour Environment Campaign and others were very strongly opposed (details) !

Just where is the evidence that this plant is green in any real and proper sense? Its notable that Mr Bradshaw says nothing in his letter about how this plant would contribute to that which is truly green, the creation of a low waste society, through waste reduction, reuse and recycling. He refers to the formerly proposed plant as ‘modern’ and ‘clean’ – in fact incineration is the thinking of the last century not the 21st and a technology than is massively outclassed by other options now available.

Invest in creating a low waste economy: create jobs, boost efficiency, cut pollution...

Bristol Evening Post columnist Suzanne Savill is someone I’ve often disagreed with (see here and here). She is hardly an advocate of green living. However, in this weekends column, leaving aside some comments that have an unfair dig at recycling, I very strongly agree with the main thrust of her argument on waste. She said ‘…the EU has rightly identified the vast amounts of waste going into limited landfill sites as a concern, it does not appear to have recognised the cause of much of our waste.’ Spot on. To solve the waste problem we need to address its roots – and we haven’t! The focus has largely been on recycling and not much on waste prevention, reduction and reuse as I’ve long and repeatedly argued eg here.

Suzanne correctly identifies the growing stockpiles of waste collected for recycling as a problem, giving Recycling UK figures of 100,000 tonnes of waste paper and cardboard currently in warehouses, growing at 8,300 tonnes every week – meaning a stockpile of 200,000 tonnes within months!! (It must be said that some feel the stockpiling reports in the media have been 'overblown' however).

She makes some very pertinent suggestions about what we should be doing as a priority eg legislation or systems of taxation to ensure that manufacturers don’t use so much packaging in the first place; not exporting waste to China and elsewhere, instead using the materials better in the UK; shops providing bags made from recycled cardboard and paper; using recycled materials to make packaging.

Yes, yes, yes – have you been reading the waste section of my blog Suzanne or perhaps the Green’s manifesto?? Some of her list of suggestions are being taken up but far too slowly and far from comprehensively. To set up the most efficient and the most sustainable systems of resource use and waste management you need to ‘complete the circle’ ie have a complete cycle of: cutting out resource use that is unnecessary; using and reusing products and resources efficiently; having localised and national reuse and recycling facilities; widespread production using reused products and recycled materials; making the consumption of products made from recycled materials commonplace and preferable…

We dont have law and taxation favouring this. We don’t have much infrastructure for doing all this. We have not had much investment in this. We’ve not had the total systems thinking needed. Masses of new jobs could be created by setting up local reduction, reuse, recycling economies and a low waste, even zero waste, national economy/society. What better time than now for putting in the government money needed (see the Green New Deal report)? It will be a massive lost opportunity if we don’t.

Talking trash on Bristol City Council (again!)

I see that Bristol's councillors have again been talking trash!

The mass incineration they seem so keen on is the thinking of the past - why keep recycling it ??

We need central and local government investment in waste reduction, reuse and recycling.

We need much more investment in making things from recycled materials here in the UK - and we need consumers to preference buy items made from recycled materials once they are made more available (some background here).

Now is the time to direct govt money this way - to create jobs and build a greener economy for the future!

Praise the milkman!

Following recent letters in the local press on the recycling of plastic milk bottles/cartons I’d like to sing the praises for my local milk delivery. Ok the milk costs a bit more but the service is great, other food/drink can also be delivered and the glass milk bottles are reused dozens of times – by far the most environmentally friendly option. Go to
http://www.milkdeliveries.co.uk/doorstep/ for more. We must not get over-hooked, as the council and government often are, on the idea of recycling as the greenest option.

Sam Weston’s letter to the Bristol Evening Post (‘Where can I recycle plastic milk cartons?’) first drew an editors comment and then several letters (‘Recycling’, Bristol Evening Post Soapbox, August 28) including from Janet Peacock, Mrs M Brannigan, and City Councillor Judith Price, who is the Executive Member for Neighbourhoods and thus has responsibility for waste management. All gave useful comments on plastic recycling but not one person pointed to the delivery of milk in reuseable glass bottles as the best option – Cllr Price in particular would have performed a good public service if she had pointed this out. Shifting to having milk delivered cuts down on plastic bottles massively. The council should be doing a lot more to promote waste reduction and reuse as the two best options.

I acknowledge that many things come in plastic bottles and other plastic containers or wrappers however. Its best to try to avoid these as far as possible (not always easy I know!) and the government should be doing more, legislating as required, to cut the use of plastic in short-life ways down to a minimum right at the source. This reduction approach is by far the best environmental option compared to going to the financial and environmental costs of collecting light, high volume plastics for recycling. However, since this is just not happening on a sufficient scale, the council could be doing more on plastic recycling as the next best option.

Who is living in the real world?

I've just done a head to head debate on Bristol's Star Radio with Knowle Lib Dem Cllr Gary Hopkins about whether corn starch plastic bags should be introduced for use in the brown bin food recycling system.

Its noteable that he had no answer to my description of the environmental impact of the bags themselves, particularly set against re-using newspaper. He made no comment on whether land should be used to grow food instead of crops to make plastic bags. He had no reply to my point about even low waste paper households such as my own having sufficient unwanted paper to wrap up a bit of food waste. He did not respond to my point about recycling only being the third best option in the waste management hierarchy - reduce, and re-use first.

His main genuine argument seemed to be based on the idea of increased support for the brown bin system if bags are introduced. Whether there would be increased take up is debateable. Its a maybe - something we would not know for sure until we did it. In some places support rates rise but there is evidence that this is not always so. Its missing the point anyway because there is no way that recycling could increase enough to compensate for the increased environmental impacts produced by manufacturing the bags!

The point of recycling is to cut environmental impacts but food waste recycling with corn starch bag use would have a higher environmental impact than without them - somewhat defeating the object. If he's unsure about this point then why doesn't he, and in fact the council itself, agree to do a full environmental audit of the system with and without plastic bags. If it can be shown that total impact is lower with the bags I'll even sign his petition on them - to date the poor chap still has just three signatures, and one of those is his own!

His jibe during the debate about greens/me not addressing the 'real world' presumeably means his 'real world' where its better to grow crops to make plastic bags than food for the hungry!

Land to grow food? Or land to grow crops to make plastic bags?

It turns out that the Bristol Blogger prioritises growing corn to make plastic bags over using the land to grow food for the hungry. Blogger likes the plastics and associated petrochemical and agrochemical industry enough to be in favour of making corn starch biodegradable plastic bags available to contain food waste in Bristol’s brown bin recycling system. This much is revealed by the debate on his site:
http://thebristolblogger.wordpress.com/2007/08/11/greener-than-thou/

Blogger has taken quite a panning in the blog comments following his posting criticising me and Southville’s Green Councillor Charlie Bolton http://charlie-boltons-southville-blog.blogspot.com/ for wanting people to wrap their food waste in the already available newspaper, or indeed other waste paper that finds its way into your house whether you like it or not.

Blogger has yet to be joined by anyone else to defend making the plastic bags available – a position just like Knowle Lib-Dem Councillor Gary Hopkins whose one week old e-petition favouring the introduction of these bags http://www.bristol.gov.uk/item/epetitionview.html?PetitionID=190 has to date just one signature on it – his own!! And the only positive discussion comment to date is Cllr Hopkins' alone, with several negative ones.

Neither the Bristol Blogger or Cllr Hopkins (or Bristol City Council itself) seems to have properly weighed up the additional environmental impacts that will result from the introduction of these bags. This impact is very well hinted at by one of the discussion comments (copied below) on Cllr Hopkins e-petition, posted by Josie McLellan:

I can't help thinking it is a little irresponsible to promote the use of these bags without a full audit of their environmental impact. This would have to to take into account: 1. The resources used in the production and transportation of the bags, esp. water for irrigation, the oil used in fertiliser manufacture, production and shipping, and the chemicals used to stabilise the plastic. 2. The decrease in food production caused by growing the corn to make the bags. 3. Potential biodiversity losses involved in growing large quantities of corn. 4. Whether or not the corn used to produce the bags is GM free. 5. What, if any, by-products are given off as the bags biodegrade. 6. Any extra expense involved in composting waste wrapped in these bags. E.g. would the machinery have to be adjusted? It is hard to imagine that the environmental impact of these bags would compare favourably to using unwanted newspaper (e.g. the Bristol Observer) to wrap food

If the bags are introduced and people use them instead of or as well as the newspaper/other waste paper already in their homes, then the impact of the bags is added to that of the paper.
What we really need to do to be truly green with our food waste is to reduce then eventually remove the need for a collection system altogether (no lorries and no newspaper or plastic bags to contain waste) by building up household and neighbourhood composting. We are currently a long way from this yet however, with a vocal minority, yes minority (including the Bristol Blogger), having a go at the brown bin system and sometimes recycling itself – these people are hardly likely to be inclined to take full responsibility for their own food waste by composting it.

Authorities not good at environmental information and education

Why has no-one from the local council’s who’ve introduced new recycling systems replied to Rob Ashbee’s perceptive questions and observations about waste (‘Household waste disposal’, Bristol Evening Post Soapbox, July 21)? I can only conclude from this and from what Rob said, that the authorities simply aren’t trying hard enough, or performing adequately enough, to communicate the full benefits and reasons for the new recycling systems, which are substantial, as detailed below.

Rob said ‘To help me decide on the real value of recycling in the list priorities of actions….I would love to see a summation of the benefits to our planet…Somebody please provide this to help convince me.’. The information required to answer his request is easily available and is fully accepted science but he got a deafening silence instead. This totally ignores the immense value we would get from good quality environmental information and education.

Rob is right to say that government and councils are not doing enough to tackle waste at source. Waste reduction and minimisation should be top priority and is the most environmentally friendly option (reuse of objects is second and recycling third priority). He is right to say that household waste is a relatively small proportion of total waste – in fact its less than half the 20% he suggests and not enough is being done about industrial and commercial waste. He is also right to say that if we were all genuinely concerned we would focus our efforts first on the most environmentally damaging activities, correctly listing driving and flying as examples, to which I would add the type and source of the food we eat. Contrary to popular conceptions in a recent opinion poll whilst recycling does help fight climate change quite well its not the most effective action one can take. A truly green approach would do all that Rob suggests but then we only have token green action or ‘greenwash’ at present.

Rob is wrong to suggest that burying waste in landfill sites and burning waste in incinerators may not be such a bad option after all (environmentally these are bottom of the waste management priority list). One can see why some reach this conclusion if environmental information is not regularly and effectively communicated though.

Having said that recycling is third in the waste priority list and not the most environmentally friendly option, it is still most definitely one we need to take because of the clear and substantial benefits, especially in comparison to landfilling and incineration. Recycling massively conserves energy and water resources, thus cutting air and water pollution. Figures in Kevin Byrnes book ‘Environmental Science’ (2001), state a 90–97% reduction in energy use and air/water pollution for aluminium recycling. There are cuts in energy/water use and air/water pollution of 47-85% for steel, 23-74% for paper, and 4-50% for glass. There is also a 97% cut in mining waste by recycling steel and an 80% cut in mining waste by recycling glass.

Recycling materials makes ‘virgin’ resources last longer and reduces UK reliance on resources from other countries. It cuts waste disposal costs and thus the council tax and creates jobs in a developing sector of the economy. Participation by everyone raises environmental awareness and responsibility for waste production.

There are practical issues with the recycling systems to work on certainly, and we don’t yet have a genuinely green and coherent approach to resources, but the overall benefits of recycling are undeniable. Come on local council’s – why aren’t you writing this!!

We've had this green debate before!!

Is this the standard of 'green' debate we should expect in Bristol? Bristol Conservative leader Councillor Richard Eddy, photographed of course - since all Conservatives were really Greens all along - looking very concerned that newspapers are not being recycled at the city council, ' slagging off ' Councillor Gary Hopkins and his Lib-Dem colleagues as 'two-faced' ('Recycling - is it one rule for us and another for the council?', Post, February 6). Councillor Hopkins of course has a go back, in characteristically bruising style. Both claim to be Green these days, because they feel (as they have done in the past) that there are votes in it of course, but engage in the debate in the most un-green manner!

Councillors Eddy and Hopkins both seem to have a particular fixation with recycling, as if it is an end in itself! This one feature of politicians who are not Green but who are trying to appear Green. Actually recycling is far from the top of the list as far as being environmentally friendly is concerned. The first priority is waste reduction or minimisation and on this basis I'd be asking why there are so many newspapers at the council that need dealing with in the first place! After reduction comes the reuse of objects so that they do not enter the waste stream: for example the refilling of bottles. It's not until one gets down to the third level in the waste management hierarchy that one gets to recycling, composting and the recovery of energy from waste and yet much of the focus is here, both in government targets and council action.

Real Greens would be campaigning hard to emphasise the need for reduction and for reuse as our top priorities instead of quibbling over a relatively small point about city council newspaper recycling, the solution to which appears to be forthcoming anyway! However, I've no doubts that Councillor Eddy has achieved his political objective of getting some significant publicity by appearing to be concerned about so-called 'green issues'.

My great fear when I see and take part in the Green debate of today is that we have been here before. Back in the late eighties and early nineties there was a surge of interest in and concern for all things Green, as there is now. Politicians in the big parties suddenly 'became green' and claimed to have green policies. Yet if they had and they had followed through on those policies nearly twenty years on we would surely expect far fewer problems rather than the greater problems we actually have!

Something I wrote back in summer 1990, in response to Bristol City Council's Green Charter, is as worryingly relevant today as it was then:

'Can the institutions and decision making processes and politicians who have been in power and caused the problem really be trusted to solve it? Will they compromise at crunch points, as has happened over the years which have brought us to this point? Indeed we must ask whether the political will for real action can exist without Green Party councillors on the City Council. One of the big dangers is that people will feel that everything is ok because 'the council is doing something' when nothing fundamental has changed and environmental problems are more urgent than ever. It is vital that everyone keeps the pressure for action on, and remembering the kind of politicians that have given us our problems we must all beware of 'greenspeak'.'

Reduce, reuse, recycle, recover - in this order !!

As well as experiencing Bristol's fairly new recycling/composting system with its brown bins...I'm working on a waste management policy at the moment. Actually recycling is far from the top of the list as far as being environmentally friendly is concerned.

The different options for dealing with waste issues are considered as a waste management hierarchy. The first priority is waste reduction or minimisation. After reduction comes the reuse of objects so that they do not enter the waste stream: for example the refilling of bottles. It is not until one gets down to the third level in the hierarchy that one gets to recovery, which includes materials recycling, composting and the recovery of energy from waste by a whole range of methods (some more environmentally friendly than others). Waste disposal is at the bottom of the hierarchy and includes final disposal to landfill and the incineration of waste without recovering the energy.

Our society is upside down as far as what we do with our waste is concerned because the option we use most is at the bottom of the list of environmental priorities! Thus greens are campaigning hard to emphasise the need for reduction and for reuse as our top priorities. There does of course also need to be a shift to recycling and composting but there are certainly dangers in thinking that these alone are the complete solution to all our waste and environmental problems because they are not - as their position in the waste management hierarchy illustrates.

Without significant reductions in waste we will still have to deal with very large amounts of material in a fuel and money intensive way. For example, currently Bristol sends compostable material all the way to Dorset in large lorries because it has not yet developed a composting facility locally. In one sense moving to more recycling is a relatively 'easy' step to take, despite all the teething problems, inconvenience and costs of new systems. What would really tackle our waste and pollution problems is a very significant shift to producing minimal waste and designing for reuse, repair and long life products. This is a much more difficult step to take in the sense of the scale of change because it ultimately implies restructuring our economy so that instead of being geared to mass consumption it is geared to conserving our real wealth. Thus being green is as much about a new economics as it is about the environment.