The organics Resource Recovery Centre in Shepparton is operated by Western Composting Technology and processes greens, commercial food, and industrial organic wastes.
Organics recycling at the centre is one of the ways we help companies to minimise waste.
We also share information, knowledge and years of experience to help organisations identify opportunities to avoid or minimise all refuse and implement systems and processes to reuse, recycle, recover energy, treat and dispose of any waste that can't be avoided or minimised.
ORGANICS RECYCLING
We share our knowledge and experience with local government and businesses to implement clean, efficient and sustainable systems and processes for the source-separation and storage of food waste and garden organics (or green waste).
Particular attention is paid to workplace health and hygiene, pest and odour control and the selection of compostable bags that are compatible with our tunnel composting process.
Highly putrescible food organics material makes up a high percentage of the waste stream produced by the municipal and commercial and industrial sectors.
Waste materials that are classified as food organics and can be composted at our Resource Recovery Centre in Shepparton include:
- Fruit and vegetables
- Meats and poultry (including bones <15mm)
- Fats and oils
- Seafood (including crustaceous seafood material)
- Dairy products (solid and liquid)
- Bread, pastry and flours (including rice and corn flours)
- Coffee grounds
Other materials that can be composted include food and beverage processing wastes, abattoir, poultry, fish and shellfish, grease interceptor trap effluent, tannery wastes (not containing chromium) and wool scouring wastes, paper pulp and biosolids (sewage sludge).
WHY RECYCLE AT OUR SHEPPARTON RESOURCE RECOVERY CENTRE ?
Recycling is one of the easiest things you can do to help the environment. Natural resources like wood and fresh water and raw materials like oil and iron ore are all required to make new packaging that we consume and discard. Making products and packaging from recycled materials uses less of these resources.
As we have discovered at the Resource Recovery Centre (Shepparton), the recycling process has many benefits including:
- Protecting natural habitats by reducing the amount of raw materials being extracted from the environment
- Reducing air and water pollution generated through the extraction, refinement and processing of raw materials
- Saving energy used in the extraction, refining, transportation and processing of raw materials into products and reducing greenhouse gas emissions
- Decreasing the amount of rubbish sent to landfill and reducing the need for new waste disposal facilities
- Helping communities and the economy by encouraging innovation and creating jobs in the recycling industry
For more information about our Resource Recovery Centre, visit Western Composting Technology Pty Ltd, call our Contact Centre on 1300 267 4696 or enquire online.
CO-MINGLED RECYCLING
Most of us are familiar with the concept of fully co-mingled (or mixed recycling) because we do it at home. Materials that we consume in our everyday lives at home and at work such as cardboard, paper, plastics, glass, metals, timber, electrical equipment and batteries are collected and transported to our own and third-party facilities for sorting and separation.
When recyclables are collected using only the one container, the collected recyclables need to be further sorted at a Resource Recovery Centre. Before a material is processed for recycling it is necessary to separate it from other components in the waste stream. Manual sorting involves the removal of large, visible items of contamination from recyclable materials.
Materials have many unique physical properties including electromagnetism, density, colour, transparency, size and conductivity which are applied in mechanical separation processes. This includes magnetic drum and belt separators for mineral beneficiation, impurity removal and scrap metal sorting, eddy currents to separate non-ferrous metals from non-conducting (non-metallic) materials, electrostatic separators used for the removal of plastic from other materials, optical scanners to separate optically transparent from opaque materials, air classification and bounce separators for the separation of materials of different densities but similar particle size.
Processed materials are baled to reduce volume and transported to local manufacturers. These businesses reuse the material to manufacture new products such as cardboard boxes, drink bottles, plastic bollards and wine glasses.
SOURCE-SEPARATED RECYCLING
Source-separation is the separation of waste into its components and storage in separate bins or bags. Each component is then collected in a separate collection vehicle or compartment of a vehicle to be transported to reprocessing facilities.
Source separation is at present carried out in the recycling of paper, glass, aluminium and plastics. The concept of source-separation using multiple bins or compartmentalised bins is attractive for some customers because materials can be sold to the reprocessing facility to offset the cost of collection and transportation.
CONSTRUCTION AND DEMOLITION (C&D) WASTE RECYCLING
The cost of landfill cell construction, the landfill levy and carbon pricing mechanism provide a strong incentive to avoid weight-based disposal charges by recovering reusable and recyclable components from the C&D waste stream. The following materials can be reused, reprocessed or recycled:
- Concrete
- Bricks
- Mixed masonry
- Builders rubble
- Asphalt
- Steel and non-ferrous metals such as aluminium, stainless steel, and copper piping or wire
- Timber
- Plastics
- Plasterboard
- Rock and excavation stone
- Soil and sand
- Roof tiles
- Cardboard
- Carpet
- Insulation
- Rubber
The materials are transported to Source Separated Reprocessors and Mixed Load Facilities. Examples of products from reprocessed C&D waste materials include:
- Crushed concrete, brick, rock and stone is used as aggregate in road pavement subbase, drainage, irrigation and landscaping applications
- Reclaimed asphalt pavement is used in new asphalt
- Ground plasterboard is used as a gypsum replacement, or mixed with organics material to improve soil structure in agricultural applications
- Ferrous and non-ferrous metals are smelted and recycled back into metal products
- Pelletised plastic is recycled into a range of plastic or plastic composite products for agricultural, residential and infrastructure applications (such as piping, decking, fencing)
- Chipped timber is used in landscaping applications
- Soil is used in soil conditioners or mixed with organic material to improve soil structure in gardening and landscaping applications
ENERGY RECOVERY
Some materials such as plastics, textiles and timber have a high embodied energy. The mixed materials are shredded and reprocessed as an alternative fuel for power stations and cement kilns.
Other materials that we can collect and reuse, recycle or reprocess include:
- Polystyrene
- Dental amalgam
- Fluorescent tubes, HID, CFL light globes and LED lights
- Batteries
- E-waste including TVs, DVD players, mobile phones, power tools, toys, videos, computers, keyboards, printers, kitchen appliances
- Photographic and x-ray waste
MAKE A DIFFERENCE
To help save precious resources, check that you are recycling as much of your household and office waste as you can. Every time you get it right you are making a difference.
Here are some of the savings generated by recycling the everyday items from your house.
Each year kerbside recycling in Victoria:
- saves over 11,000 megalitres of water (enough to fill more than 4,500 Olympic sized swimming pools)
- prevents 386,000 tonnes of greenhouse gases being emitted into the atmosphere (equivalent to taking more than 64,000 cars off the road for a year)
For more information about our resource recovery, collection and recycling services, visit Ecocycle Australia Pty Ltd , call our Resource Recovery Centre, Shepparton on 1300 267 4696 or enquire online.