City ponders waste plans

The City of Busselton will attempt to keep all options open for waste management into the future, with councillors next week set to adopt three separate reports on waste management strategies.

The reports include a locally focused Waste Disposal Strategy and the South West-focused Regional Waste Management Strategy and South West Waste to Energy report, which detail plans to use the new Dunsborough facility for the short to medium term while investigating the other options.

Other options to be considered include the possibility of sharing a landfill site with the Shire of Augusta-Margaret River, as well as looking at the possibility of working with other councils in the South West with a view to a regional landfill facility.

The final report also investigates the feasibility of converting waste to energy, which initial feedback suggests is not viable at this stage.

City of Busselton chief executive Mike Archer said the idea of bringing all three reports to the council at the same time was a ploy to keep "all balls in the air" while informing councillors of the available options in regards to waste disposal in the future.

Mr Archer said chief executives from South West councils had met several times leading up to the Regional Waste Management Strategy being brought to the council and he said what needed to be done now was to decide if the councils endorsed it.

"At this stage everybody was saying it was all well and good … but I need the endorsement of our council," he said.

"What the outcome in the report says is there are significant financial benefits to moving together.

"That's why we actually need to talk to our councils." Mayor Ian Stubbs told the Times the main objective of the council was to reduce the amount of waste being sent to landfill.

Cr Stubbs, a big supporter of the process of converting waste to energy, said there were a lot of new controls over how councils could dispose of rubbish in landfill situations, which were imposing an enormous cost on ratepayers.

In June 2015, the first draft of the regional waste management study by Talis Consultants indicated savings would be made by participating local governments through improved purchasing and contracting conditions as well as economies of scale in waste operations.

Councillors will decide at next week's meeting whether to endorse the officer's recommendation which suggests the City use the Dunsborough Waste Facility on Vidler Road while also progressing with investigations into the regional CapeROC waste management system and investigations with other local governments into a regional system.

Up to $100,000 a year is being made available in the waste services operating budget for the assessment of alternative waste disposal sites.