Taking the rubbish out of recycling data

In the interests of stimulating discussion, The GPT Group (GPT) is putting its own operations under the microscope with a critical analysis of some of the reported results. The aim is to provide concrete examples of how the property and waste industries can work towards a better waste measurement and reporting regime. In turn, this will assist with decision-making when choosing practices to best meet waste management objectives.

GPT has set strong objectives to achieve a genuinely sustainable outcome in waste and resource management. Its objectives centre around achieving a 98% diversion of waste from landfill, as well as closed-loop recovery - ie, the same resources can be used over and over again in the same production cycles.

Many other companies and government agencies have also set such sustainability objectives; however, there is much that needs to be done to ensure that the good intentions of these objectives result in real progress towards a closed-loop outcome. For progress to be made, managers need to make decisions with a better understanding of the end-of-life outcomes of their waste management processes. This requires more meaningful data than what is currently provided.

GPT therefore advocates, and is undertaking, a shift from inputs-based to outcomes-based reporting.  An inputs-based report primarily looks at waste at the point of disposal. Whereas, an outcomes-based report follows the waste all the way to its end destination - in essence shifting the boundaries of where waste data is being reported. With accurate data and reviewing results at the end destination, the outcomes-based reporting approach will provide managers with the most appropriate information for waste management reporting and decision-making.

What is outcomes-based reporting?

Outcomes-based reporting in waste and resource management accurately tracks and categorises information about the end destination of disposed items. Using the common phrases of ‘cradle-to-cradle’ or ‘cradle-to-grave’, an outcomes-based report will provide both qualitative and quantitative information about the ‘cradles’ and ‘graves’.

At GPT, an outcomes-based reporting method has been designed to provide better measures for assessing performance against its sustainability objectives for waste and resource management. The principal performance measures will be:

• Waste intensity - a measure of waste generation rates per m² at assets.
• Percentage diversion from landfill - a measure of recovery rates.
• Percentage A-grade recovery - a measure of quality where processes meet the closed-loop objective.

This reporting method indicates both the quantity and quality of the results of our waste and resource management processes.

There are three main elements of an outcomes-based report that drive improvement:

1. Accurate weights - the first preference is actual weights. If these are not available, verified site densities are to be applied to volume measures to derive weights. Industry average densities are undesirable.
2. Deducting contamination - processes should be implemented to net off any contamination or non-recoverables within recycling streams so that only the recoverable items are reported in recovery figures.
3. Grading the outcome - GPT has named recovery outcomes A-, B- and C-grade. By adding this grading information to reports, the information improves from simply reporting the input weights to a recycling bin to assessing what happens to the contents of the receptacle at their final destination.

How do the recovery grades work?

GPT is implementing the recovery grading system so that the quality of the recovered material can be considered alongside its quantity. Each grade is explained below:

A-grade recovery:

A-grade recovered products:

• meet a closed loop objectives;
• may be used over and over again, constantly being returned to the same production cycle; and
• can be recovered without any consequent hazardous material build-up in the environment.

At GPT, the recovered A-grade product consists mostly of cardboard and paper, some organics and robust recoverable materials such a glass and metals.

B-grade recovery

B-grade recovered products are:

• down-cycled to a lower-value product;
• have a limited number of recovery cycles; and
• produce valueless by-products after several recycling cycles.

Generally, plastic products are down-cycled in Australia and this waste stream makes up the bulk of the B-grade recovered products in GPT’s waste management processes.

C-grade recovery

C-grade recovered products are those which are produced in a waste diversion process but are only available for a single additional application.

At GPT, this generally refers to mixed source waste products made up of a composted mix of organics and other residual waste. Energy recovery from non-renewable sources would also fall into this category.

Landfill

This is the non-recovered waste. Sources include:

• general waste processes;
• contamination within a recycling stream; or
• losses from recovery processes.

Put simply, if it starts in a bin and ends up in a hole in the ground, this should reasonably be considered landfill and GPT will report it that way where it is identified.

A case study of input-based vs outcomes-based reporting

The following example demonstrates the differences between an inputs-based reporting system and an outcomes-based reporting system for waste and resource management. The inputs data is taken from a waste services provider’s bills and monthly reports. The data in the case study is for a mixed commingled container recovery service at a shopping centre in Sydney.

To avoid singling out any waste operators, the asset and service provider information has been excluded. Similar results have been found at multiple assets, so the finger cannot be pointed at a supposed rogue operator. This simply illustrates the need to reform the waste reporting processes.

Other information in Table 1 is actual data from the service provider and billing costs.

Table 1:
	Input-based reporting	Outcome-based reporting
Monthly bill	$673	$673
Receptacle	660 L	660 L
Number of collections	31	31
Weight/bin	53.5 kg (derived from data)	18 kg (average measured weights)
Cost/tonne for service	$405 (calculated)	$1206 (calculated)
Reported results	1.66 tonnes of ‘Primary recycling - commingled containers’	380 kg of PET plastics were recovered to be pelletised and sold to manufacturers to produce lower grade plastic products (Grade B recovery)
		40 kg of aluminium was recovered and sold as a commodity (Grade A recovery)
		80 kg of glass was recovered, crushed and used as an input to glass manufacturing (Grade A recovery)
		58 kg of mixed residual waste (contamination) was sent in landfill

The inputs-based report for this commingled stream presents a picture that suggests there is three times more ‘recycling’ than actually occurs and nearly 15 times what would be reported as meeting the GPT closed-loop objective (A-grade only).

Density data

The first point of interest is the difference between the current reported weight and the measured weight per bin. The reported weight per bin, based on incorrect density assumptions, is around three times higher than the actual weight per bin. So the simple bottom line for the above commingle container service is that it costs nearly three times as much per tonne than is reported. To improve current processes, a simple regime of verifying densities or weights must be implemented at the site level.

Contamination

The second point to consider is that contamination is not taken into account with the ‘recycling’ result - reported as 1.66 tonnes in Table 1.  Effectively, everything that goes into those yellow-lidded bins is reported as ‘Primary recycling - commingled containers’.  Yet even the quickest of visual inspections highlights that a certain percentage of the contents is not recoverable.

Contamination, such as food waste and bags of ‘rubbish’, is incorporated in the recovery figures, whereas they should be deducted as it ends up in landfill. When these contamination levels are taken into account, the actual recovery rates drop further and the cost per tonne rises further. In effect, the reported 1.66 tonnes for resource recovery is actually closer to 500 kg when taking into account realistic densities and contamination.

Grading the outcomes

Once we have reasonable integrity for the recovery weights, the final point to consider for an outcomes-based reporting system is what actually gets recovered and how this compares to the objective. A cradle-to-cradle analysis is required here.

To achieve this, the report should include information on material flows through to their end destination. The outcomes are a range of commodities for re-use in the production processes or the return of value to the earth. Depending on the retained value or closed-loop nature, these can be graded.

Consider the input-based data in the example in Table 1 which is reported as ‘commingled’. This is not an outcome that can be assessed against a closed-loop objective. In this case, a range of glasses, plastics and metals are recovered and traded as inputs to another process. There is no such thing as recycling a commingle. The term commingled is simply a description of the receptacle used to achieve the outcomes.

With an outcomes-based reporting approach, the notion of primary versus secondary recycling targets becomes irrelevant. Primary and secondary only refer to the location of the separation processes, not the actual outcome of these processes. The separation processes are unimportant compared to attributes such as retained value, waste miles, ethical stewardship, processing energy, etc. These attributes should be considered more important than whether the waste is recovered through a facility that deals with yellow- or red-lidded bins.

Summary

Outcomes-based data reporting is a significant shift for the waste industry. Waste services providers will be required to provide a greater level of transparency and a willingness to explain the disadvantages as well as the advantages of their services.

However, outcomes-based reporting is going to require an equally large shift for the waste service recipient. Firstly, in nearly every case there will need to be an acknowledgement that publicly reported recycling results have been exaggerated and possibly misinterpreted in the past. Data verification may only be achievable in some cases through on-site management processes. Therefore, managers can no longer completely pass on responsibility for reporting integrity to waste industry vendors.

However, most of all, industry will need to take up the challenge of achieving the best quality outcomes from recycling, not only the highest rates of recycling.