Traffic congestion and air pollution in London seriously impact the health of those visiting, living and working in Westminster. Thankfully, the City Council is taking measures to tackle these issues through the Greener City Action Plan, a programme which sets out how the City of Westminster will become more sustainable.
Private commercial waste collections increase congestion and air pollution
The City Council is a Waste Collection Authority (WCA), making us a legal default collection service in Westminster. In addition to street cleansing operations, we do multiple daily collections to ensure waste from homes and businesses is constantly removed.
Collections from private commercial waste providers place an unnecessary burden on the environment since they duplicate journeys that already exist as part of the City Council’s collection system. This further increases traffic congestion, pollution levels and fails to add any genuine value for the local community. Increased vehicle movements also have a negative impact on traffic safety.
These private collectors may also use small and inefficient vehicles, resulting in an excessive number of round trips to collect waste as well as outdated vehicles which produce high exhaust emission levels.
By having Westminster City Council collect your business’ commercial waste, you can reduce these duplicated journeys by up to 80%.
Supporting cleaner air in Westminster
Westminster City Council refuse collection truck
The City Council operates to the cleanest collection fleet in London as they are fitted with Eminox exhaust filters which exceed Euro 6 emission standards. In fact, 25% of our fleet is already electrically powered. We have also recently launched the first fully electric 26-tonne truck in Westminster which runs on electricity generated from the general waste we collect.
The shipping of poor-quality materials for recycling overseas is no longer a viable option for commercial recycling collectors. And rightly so. Several countries, such as China and Malaysia, have banned or severely restricted the import of such materials. Recycling collectors in the UK must now develop more local, sustainable, and high-quality waste management solutions for recycling these materials.
The City Council has avoided this issue altogether thanks to the early implementation of a quality control system. This ensures recyclable materials are recycled in the UK where environmental standards are much higher. We collect materials that are properly segregated so they can be recycled effectively into new resources and products. Having this local recycling infrastructure in place avoids having to travel long distances between the area where the materials are collected and where they are recycled. This greatly reduces vehicle movements and their associated exhaust emissions.
If you have any questions about how to recycle more effectively with is then please contact us.
Want to know more about recycling locally and reducing traffic congestion and air pollution? Download your copy of the congestion and air quality leaflet.
