Council applies to Zero Waste Scotland for food waste collection funding.

The Highland Council has applied to The Scottish Government’s Zero Waste Scotland programme for £500,000 funding to support the roll out of separate food waste collections in the City of Inverness, and nearby communities of Culloden, Smithton, Balloch and Milton of Leys.

Under the Waste (Scotland) Regulations 2012 law, The Highland Council will be required to promote separate food waste collections for households in Inverness by 1 January 2014, have the collections in place before 1 January 2016. Businesses producing food waste will also be affected by the new regulations.

28,000 households in the Inverness area will be included in the roll out which will be implemented by the Council as soon as possible after the offer of a grant to the Council and prior to the dates set out in the legislation.

Households will be supplied with a kitchen caddy (a small bin that can be kept at the sink) liners for the kitchen caddy, and a larger bin (around 25 litres in capacity) which will be put out for collection.

The ongoing annual revenue costs of the service are estimated at £385,000. The Council estimates that the savings from avoiding landfill costs, based on an annual collection of 2,300 tonnes of food waste, could be £270,000 and therefore the net pressure on the council’s revenue budget would be £115,000 per annum.

Members of the Council’s Transport, Environmental and Community Services Committee will be asked in a report to the meeting of Thursday 17 January to approve the application to Zero Waste Scotland for one-off funding of £500,000.