They mostly do their work in secret – it only becomes apparent when it isn’t happening: In Vöcklabruck, the 36 employees at the building yard, waterworks and garden center help to ensure that the streets are cleared of snow, the paths and squares are clean and illuminated at night are, the rubbish is disposed of and that the city presents itself attractively with its floral decorations.
The disposal of the resulting waste is particularly complex. Wegmacher regularly empties almost 300 rubbish bins, bringing around four tonnes of material to disposal every month. Three men from the municipal garbage disposal are on the road every week to empty the household garbage cans. The costs for processing the residual waste amounted to almost 228,000 euros in the previous year. Unfortunately, the flat-rate waste fee did not bring the desired success, according to the Vöcklabruck city office. Biogenic waste is still disposed of with residual waste. Although the city has almost doubled the number of bio-waste bins provided, the importance of bio-waste collection has not increased to the same extent. Analyzes also show that residual waste still contains a great deal of packaging material.
Biomaterial out of residual waste!
Due to the laborious separation of foreign matter from the organic waste bin collection, the processing costs have now exploded: in 2018 it was 176,000 euros, but within the following three years the costs rose to more than 235,000 euros. Mayor Peter Schobesberger (SP): “Our goal must be to reduce packaging material and biomaterial from the residual waste and to free the biobins from plastic waste. I ask the people of Vöcklabruck to actively cooperate here.” Mistakes would increase garbage fees and destroy valuable resources, says the mayor.
In the city of Vöcklabruck, around 1000 tons of organic waste are collected and processed into compost every year. This valuable raw material is used both in agriculture and in home gardens. But recently, composters have had to struggle more and more with sorting out waste. Leftover meat, plastic bags, yoghurt pots, food packaging, cigarette butts, dog waste and cat litter really have no place in the organic waste bin. Even hygiene waste, medicines, animal carcasses, vacuum cleaner bags and textiles had to be laboriously fished out of the organic waste.
“It would be a great help for the composters if only fruit and vegetable waste, garden weeds or lawn clippings actually ended up in the organic waste bin,” appeals environmental officer Peter Kraushaar, who also has a tip ready: “Kitchen waste can be put in newspaper, kitchen roll or napkins, for example get wrapped up.”
Source: Nachrichten
