Abstract

This assessment provides a focus on what benefits or costs arise from different waste management activities (disposal, diversion and collection) that are common across New Zealand.

Within the constraints of the current assessment, the social benefit generated by waste diversion activities, and in particular community-based operations are the key difference between waste disposal and diversion scenarios; small-scale community based operations deliver the greatest social benefit per dollar spent on activities. Resource and environmental costs were greatest for landfilling operations (including refuse transfer operations), and were typically small (relative to economic activity) for other scenarios. Collection activities can comprise significant additional costs and benefits to disposal or diversion activities.

Assessment of Waste Disposal vs Resource Recovery [PDF, 296 KB]

Contents
Summary		4
Glossary		8
1	Introduction	9
2	Background	9
3	Objective	10
4	Methods	10
4.1	Interviews	10
4.2	Scenario development	11
4.3	Assessment	11
4.4	Interpretation of the sustainability profile	13
5	Results	15
5.1	Background information	15
5.2	Processing of recyclable materials	22
5.3	Scenario development	23
5.4	Assessment	29
6	Discussion	36
7	Conclusion	38
8	Recommendations	40
9	Acknowledgements	41
10	References	41
11	Appendices	43
Appendix 1 - Data input for SAM		43
Appendix 2 - Estimation of environmental and resource use		46

Assessment of waste disposal vs resource recovery

Abstract

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