An upgrade to Brighton and Hove City Council’s recycling centre is expected to cost £2.3 million, according to a report going before senior councillors next week.
The council’s cabinet is being asked to approve a new optical sorter, chutes, conveyors and bays for the Materials Recovery Facility (MRF), in Hollingdean, next Thursday (19 March).
The project £2.3 million project is expected to be funded by borrowing from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB).
The MRF, in Upper Hollingdean Road, was designed to process paper, card, steel and aluminium cans and plastic bottles, with glass collected separately to be sold on.
The premises and equipment were built as a private finance initiative (PFI) project in 2008 and recycling requirements have since changed. The outdated equipment there relies on manual picking to maintain quality.
The report to the council’s cabinet said: “The site was specifically designed to accommodate the operational needs of a modern MRF, including the capacity to adapt to evolving waste streams.
“Its configuration allows for efficient vehicle movements, appropriate separation and processing areas.
“Since construction, the complexity of packaging has increased, a wider variety of plastic polymers has entered the waste stream and participation in recycling services has grown.
“The council has been expanding the range of materials collected for recycling and further materials are to be added imminently.
“Consequently, the MRF is now processing both higher quantities and a more diverse range of materials than it was originally designed to handle.”
After the council started collecting pots, tubs and trays for recycling last June, more picking staff have been recruited to ensure these items go into the plastic stream without contaminating other recyclables.
The report said: “This dependence on manual work may increase health and safety risks, limit throughput, reduce overall efficiency and constrain the capacity to accommodate new materials that will be required under national reforms.
“MRFs typically use a mixture of manual sorting along with advanced automation, including optical sorting, ballistic separation and eddy current systems, to try to minimise manual handling and improve both safety and material quality.”
The council expects to repay the loan over 25 years at an interest rate of 4.5 per cent, with the upgrade expected to cost £130,000 a year, although these rates are not confirmed at this stage.
Some of the costs would be met from a dedicated savings fund known as the waste PFI reserve – including the borrowing costs for the first two years.
A sum of £180,000 a year would be required to pay six manual pickers and this would also be paid for from the waste PFI reserve until the 2032-33 financial year.
The report to the council’s cabinet said that there was “robust evidence” that the site in Hollingdean remained the most suitable location for the recycling centre.
Concerns have been raised about the site from neighbours in Round Hill after a series of fires.
The site currently processes 17,500 tonnes of recyclable material each year. The council is expanding the range of materials.
The cabinet is due to meet at Hove Town Hall at 2pm next Thursday (19 March). The meeting is scheduled to be webcast.
Council being strong armed by Veolia because the council is run by idiots. This lot are the idiots with the red flags.
Veolia must according to the contract sort materials as specified. Pots and trays were never not allowed only excluded by the ciubcy
Communal recycling is the issue as the MRF was designed for presorted materials but the communal part wasn’t throught through in regards it giving Veolia the right to reject it.
The council are idiots and should have supported Magpie and others in their effective services.
One more time….. idiots
I haven’t reead the report.
The glass being separate wasn’t throught through but it is beneficial to the system and it’s been baked in for a long time with most residents used to it. Although the ‘kerbside sort’ system Magpie used has its merits, its considered less viable in urban areas as the vehicles block traffic and the necessary land footprint for all the additional vehicles and individual tipping bays to provide a service to all households in B&H would likely be too big for any available sites. The compacting Refuse Collection Vehicles (RCV’s) and ‘MRF’ facilities are quite land efficient. ‘
Nationally, a lot of these MRF facilities have had to be refitted to accept and separate Pot’s Tubs and Trays (PTT’s), Carton’s and now plastic films over recent years so this is not unusual. Councils are getting a lot of money from packaging producers which is, to some extent, contingent on adding these materials as targeted within the recycling service. The economics of this ‘Producer Responsibility’ regime dwarf the additional costs from the refit. Its also a legal requirement anyway.
Besides which, PWLB is a lot cheaper to the council than Veolia financing the works and, as i assume the council owns the land that the facility sits on, it is a ‘reverting asset’ in that the Council inherit’s it, having been refitted to meet modern standards, at the end of the PFI contract.
Veolia would have had to pay for the new equipment if BHCC hadn’t already breached those terms by delivery of unsorted (paper mixed with plastics).
It’s all part of covering over the huge mistake of introducing the communal recycling.
All the authorities with high recycling rates use kerbside sorting mostly because they don’t have a dirty incinerator providing cheap disposable disguised as recovery.
Congestion argument doesn’t make sense. In the communal zone every day one glass, one refuse, one dry recycling, one food. With a planned kerbside it would be two vehicles once a week. Remember the communal vehicles congest the roads leading to where the bins need emptying.
The new package regulations mean the levy for paying councils is decided by the producers so, as BHCC as realised, if the MRF is failing (which it is see many news stories and EA data backing this up) no money from the levy will be paid to the council. The MRF can satisfy this if the material is provided as the contract (and new regulations expect) sets out. That’s why the council through it’s own idiots in charge are borrowing money to hide the mistake of not thinking through introducing the communal recycling.
The councils retrofitting are those not using kerbside sorting. Keep the paper and glass separate, keep it dry. Check for contamination before it gets tipped into a lorry.
Such a simple service working all over the country. Simply ruined by idiots that think they’re smart. Borrowing money to cover up stupid decisions it’s got i360 politics and cover up all over it.
Idiots backed up by toady brown nosing rosette waving attack dog…. idiots
The flip side is where would you park all those extra vehicles then? Equally do you really want central Brighton covered in 4 wheelie bins per house with nowhere to store it, hence the communal bins.
Equally the communal system means 1 truck does the work of about 5 rounds so is significantly cheaper and efficient to run.
A lack of education and enforcement is the real problem.
Going downstairs to my communal bin area, and seeing a green garden waste bin full of general waste, really highlights your point, Deano.
Communal recycling bins are not used anywhere else in the England because they are for idiots councils bettered smart waste contractor’s lawyers. Communal residual bins are not the issue . It’s mixing recycling in large communal bins into large vehicles and taking to a place the idiots signed a contract to NOT deliver it to unless it’s pre-sorted.
Our idiots based savings on a single crew vehicle which was abandoned once rough sleepers use the bins as a shelter.
Now want £2.3m to TRY to fix a what the idiots got so wrong.
It’s not blaming this or that it’s pointing out exactly what they did wrong.
Benjamin, that garden waste bin full of general rubbish is basically the recycling version of putting a banana peel in the microwave and then blaming the microwave when it smells.
You can spend £2.3 million on optical sorters, conveyors, chutes and whatever other futuristic robot wizardry they install at the Hollingdean site, but none of that can fix the classic human setting: “I can’t be bothered to read the label on the bin.”
People love to blame the system — communal bins, the council, Veolia, the phase of the moon — but if someone walks past three clearly labelled bins and still thinks “garden waste = perfect place for my takeaway containers and last night’s curry,” that’s not a technology problem, that’s a user error.
Recycling works best when the first sorting happens in the kitchen, not when the machines at the depot have to play detective with a bag of mystery leftovers.
Education and a bit of enforcement would probably do more than another £2 million machine. Because even the fanciest optical sorter in the world still hasn’t learned how to identify the rare species known as *The Lazy Bin User*. ♻️😄
Once again, not the point I was making. Once again, GPT is making another error. Once again, I am reminding you not to rely entirely on AI.
Benjamin, the issue you keep pointing out isn’t the tool — it’s the pattern in your responses.
Whenever something lines up with what you’re saying, there’s no problem with it being used. But the moment you’re challenged or something doesn’t support your point, the focus suddenly shifts to blaming the source instead of addressing the argument itself. That pattern keeps repeating whenever you’re called out.
At that point it stops looking like a genuine criticism and starts looking like a way to deflect from the actual point being raised. If the standard is that a source can’t be relied on, then that standard should apply consistently — not only when it’s convenient.
Deano says ” A lack of education and enforcement is the real problem.” Benj agrees, saying “Going downstairs to my communal bin area, and seeing a green garden waste bin full of general waste, really highlights your point, Deano.” You chip in, insisting the problem is user error (i.e. exactly what D & B were both saying) and that Benjamin is somehow at fault (for saying exactly what you’re saying).
Sorry, that’s also incorrect. I’ve been very consistent about using AI to fully generate replies. What GPT is noting is that I didn’t immediately jump on it the first time it was being used, because civil discussion requires giving people the benefit of the doubt.
However, when the same pattern repeated with AI misrepresenting my position and then defending that misrepresentation, it became necessary to point out the limitation. GPT is seeing a pattern because it’s the same tool being used incorrectly. GPT is arguing that I am being consistent by being inconsistent in my consistency of being inconsistently consistent.
2003 Council signs agreement with Veolia in deliver sorted recycling starts a kerbside sorted service
2012 Starts communal recycling which gives Veolia option to burn or recycle each load as it’s not compliant with the contract
2026 Magnitude of the F up so Ffff obvious idiots asking for £3m to fix it.
Fffingly idiotic decision in 2012 that has cos already cost Fffing millions and crapped all over the community projects trying to do their Ffing best
Fwit Idiots