Recycling depot plans lodged ahead of Container Refund Scheme
A CONTAINER refund depot and waste transfer station has been proposed for Geebung ahead of the Container Refund Scheme (CRS) going live on November 1.
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A CONTAINER refund depot and waste transfer station has been proposed for Geebung ahead of the Container Refund Scheme (CRS) going live on November 1.
The State Government’s scheme, recently branded Containers for Change, will allow residents and community groups to get a 10-cent refund when they recycle drink containers.
The scheme is managed by Container Exchange (CoEx) which is expected to announce the successful container refund point operators later this week.
A CoEx spokesman said there were expected to be a number of providers and more than 80 sites in Greater Brisbane, which includes Ipswich, Logan, Redland and Samford Valley.
“Container Exchange understands that a number of potential refund point operators have submitted Development Applications as part of their own due diligence but we continue to advise that there are no guarantees an individual site will be awarded a place in the Container Exchange network until commercial negotiations and planning assessments are complete,” the spokesman said.
TOMRA Collection Solutions Australia has lodged an application with Council for a site at 428 Bilsen Rd, Geebung and another at West End.
In documents lodged with Council, the applicant states it is anticipated customers would turn up at the proposed Geebung depot with, on average, 150 containers at a time.
“The front-of-house area will be open to the general public to deposit containers for refunding and will comprise nine Reverse Vending Machines (similar to a drink vending machine) fitted into the walls, bag drop points and a bulk delivery area,” documents state.
“Customers will arrive with bags of containers to be deposited in the front room area and place these into the RVMs before receiving a refund.”
The Geebung depot would also provide an after hours bag drop service for customers to insert container bags into a small door.
“The containers will be stored in this location overnight and then processed the following day using a fully automated bulk processing machine.”
The back area will contain machinery to sort the containers by recyclable product (plastic, aluminium, glass).
“The ... area will largely be used as a bulk storage area for sorted containers to be stored until a collection vehicle arrives to take these to a large (off-site) processing facility.”
The plan is for the depot to be open every day from 7am-7pm.
The CoEx spokesman said, “We are committed to having more than 230 refund points ready for the scheme’s launch on November 1 and having more than 300 in place within 12 months of the Scheme’s commencement, if not before.”
Minister for Environment Leeanne Enoch said the Containers for Change scheme had benefits for Queensland’s environment, communities and charities.
“Nearly three billion containers are used by Queenslanders each year and they are the second most commonly littered item in our environment,” Ms Enoch said.
“This is disappointing, because they can be easily recycled. Containers for Change will give Queenslanders an incentive to collect and return used containers for recycling.”
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