For Stu.

I love the Have your Say feature on the Beeb's website. Not to post to, just to read. It's just like Usenet was (is?) - the sole purpose to drive together thousands of people whose only desire in the world is to have an argument.

Anyway, today I saw this, and felt inclined to share...

Now we know more.

EDIT: You may want to read the first letter in the post below in order to remaind yourself about what's going on.

COMPOSTING AND ANAEROBIC DIGESTION

Thank you for your email of 3 June following my colleague’s reply regarding composting and anaerobic digestion. I have been asked to reply.

As my colleague stated, composting plays an important role in diverting biodegradable waste from landfill, therefore, reducing the amount of methane produced at these sites. During the process of commercial composting methane is still produced, however, this occurs in a more controlled environment than at landfill and can be used to recover energy from waste.

The Environment Agency and WRAP have created a Quality Protocol for the production and use of quality compost from source segregated biodegradable waste, this was published on15 March 2007. The Quality Protocol will help determine when compost can be considered as fully recovered and no longer waste for the purposes of the Waste Framework Directive (WFD) and should improve market confidence in the quality of compost, encouraging higher levels of demand for this material recycling. More details can be found at:

http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/subjects/waste/1019330/1334884/1713670/

Our newly published Waste Strategy for England 2007 emphasises the need to make waste prevention and reuse a central activity in all of our lives. It also stresses the need to maximise the amount of energy we recover from waste through processes such as anaerobic digestion. Anaerobic digestion is the biological treatment of biodegradable organic waste in the absence of oxygen, utilising microbial activity to break down the waste in controlled conditions. This process produces biogas, which is rich in methane and can be used as a source of renewable energy and a digestate, which is nutrient rich and can potentially be used as a soil conditioner.

Further information on the work Defra is doing to establish even more sustainable waste management practices can be found at the following website address:

http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/waste/strategy/index.htm

Defra - Customer Contact Unit

So now we know.

In an earlier post, I posited the theory that taking organic matter out of bins and putting it in composts, and therefore away from landfills, actually slows down the degrading process and is harmful to the environment.

Well, it turns out that I was utterly wrong, at least according to DEFRA. They say...

Dear Mr Kouros,

COMPOSTING AND LANDFILLING

Thank you for your letter of 5 May about composting and landfilling. I have been asked to reply and apologise for the delay in doing so.

Any potential benefits from landfilling biodegradable waste would be small compared to the benefits of composting and diverting waste from landfill. Composting waste that would otherwise go to landfill also reduces landfill methane emissions, which account for 3% of total UK greenhouse gas emissions. Composting will play an increasingly important role in diverting biodegradable waste from landfill in line with the Government's sustainable waste management objectives.

Composting is supported by a range of measures that promote sustainable waste management: including the Waste and Resources Action Programme's support for home composting, and statutory recycling and composting targets for local authorities.

The amount of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) being landfilled continues to fall: from 13.9 million tonnes in 2004-05 to 12.4 million tonnes in 2005-06. To meet our EU Landfill Directive targets, the amount of BMW the UK sends to landfill needs to fall to 11.2 million tonnes in 2010, 7.46 million tonnes in 2013 and 5.22 million tonnes by 2020.

I hope that this letter addresses your concerns.

Defra - Customer Contact Unit

Although I am now left with the concern that the methane emissions will be diverted from the landfill to composts. Where does that 3% go? Will we be forced to reduce our compost emissions by 2020?