What Happens to my Garbage?
The video below follows the journey of your household garbage.
Your bin with the red lid (household garbage) is emptied by a garbage truck weekly and taken to a landfill facility. Once there, garbage is deposited in a ‘cell’ and compacted before being covered each day to prevent odour and vermin.
Landfills are the last option in waste management as, once rubbish is deposited, it can’t be reused or recycled. However, they are still a necessity to manage waste that currently cannot be reused or recycled.
Buried rubbish in landfills produces methane, a potent gas which is harmful to the environment. Where possible, methane is collected from the landfill through pipes and used to generate electricity.
When a landfill reaches capacity it is sealed or ‘capped’ with a thick layer of clay before being covered in several layers of soil, including topsoil, before being revegetated. Old landfill sites are often used as parklands and open spaces.
What Happens to my Recycling?
The video below follows the journey of your recycling.
Your bin with the yellow lid (recycling) is picked up by the recycling truck, it is then transported to a local recycling sorting facility in Dandenong South.
Materials are first sorted by hand to remove the non-recyclables (these are called contamination) which are sent to landfill. The facility then mechanically sorts and separates the recyclables into different streams of paper, cardboard, glass, aluminium, steel and plastic containers. The separated materials are then compacted into blocks, and taken by trucks to reprocessing facilities, and used to make new products.
What Happens to my Food and Garden Waste?
The video below follows the journey of your food and garden waste.
The bin with the green lid (garden waste) is emptied by a food and garden waste truck and sent to a local processing facility, located in Dandenong South. It is turned into compost and mulch, through a process called in-vessel composting.
Using compost instead of man-made fertilisers is a much healthier alternative. Not only is it environmentally friendly, but the end result is, better gardens for our community to enjoy. Using recycled garden waste also helps to reduce landfill and in turn reduces carbon emissions.
