Approximately 200 tonnes of food waste has already been removed from Swindon’s general waste bins since the service rolled out across the Borough, which has saved the Council £30,000 in just two weeks. But what happens to it after it has been collected?
Once we’ve collected your food waste, we handle it in the most environmentally-friendly way possible. Your food waste is taken to an anaerobic digestion plant in Wiltshire, where it is turned into fertiliser for crops or converted into natural forms of energy.
That compares with putting it in your general waste where it is burnt to generate electricity. About 70 per cent of food waste is made up of water, which requires considerably more energy to burn it, making it a less efficient method of disposal than recycling.
You can see a very short video accompanying this article, together with other local news and updates from SBC, here.