Miljøprojekt, 895 – Mindre virksomheders brug af genbrugspladser

Use of Civic Amenity Sites for Disposal of Waste from Small Enterprises

4 Summary and conclusions

Under the project, a detailed survey was made of civic amenity sites in Denmark that are open for access by commercial enterprises, as well as a presentation of rules relating to: staffing, specific commercial section, opening hours, access conditions for enterprises from outside the municipality, size of catchment area, voucher options, payment structure, waste fractions and access control.

In the study a total of 338 civic amenity sites were registered, and enterprises have access to 202 of these sites. The civic amenity sites are located in 138 municipalities. Five sites are reserved for commercial enterprises only.

Generally, civic amenity sites are working and administered very differently across the country. Some sites with similar opening hours, for example, have completely different access control and rules on commercial use, and, correspondingly, sites with similar payment structure have completely different systems for access control, opening hours etc. Thus, it is not possible to set up archetypical models based on, for example, access conditions, payment structure and rules on use, thus categorising the civic amenity sites. Similarly, no pattern has been revealed showing that some schemes are more common in some regions than in others.

All but four of the civic amenity sites with commercial access are staffed.

At 46 civic amenity sites enterprises can enter the site freely, without any kind of control. At 65 sites enterprises must use a special card, token or similar. At the remaining sites with access control, it may have the form of visual control of the user, the enterprise must present an identity card or similar.

A number of civic amenity sites, primarily located in rural municipalities, are open on ly to enterprises for one or a few days a week. Just below 90 percent of the sites are also open for enterprises on Saturdays.

There are many different payment systems for enterprises. Around one third of the municipalities have a fixed fee that all enterprises located in the municipality must pay, regardless of type of enterprise. One fifth charges an enterprise-specific fee that may be, for example, one per thousand of the taxable property value/land value, based on floorage, type of enterprise or number of staff, and another fifth of the municipalities uses a weight-based charging system. At most of these sites the weight of the waste is estimated by the site staff or by the enterprise, and not by weighing.

Waste from commercial enterprises accounts for from 1 per cent to 75 per cent of total waste amounts received at the civic amenity sites. However, the volumes reported are generally based on estimates made by the site operators or on random samples. Only eight of the sites studied have a precise statement of commercial waste amounts – based on weighing of all loads received.

User survey at selected civic amenity sites

In the project a survey was made of enterprises' use and view of the civic amenity site at seven selected, representative sites.

The commercial users accounted for an average of well over 12 percent of all users on the days the survey was made. The most frequented site was visited by 22 per cent commercial users and the least frequented site by 2.5 per cent.

It is the impression from these civic amenity sites that commercial users are in general separating their waste properly into the correct fractions.

Almost all enterprises deliver several different waste fractions at the civic amenity site – often three or more, even if only very small quantities are delivered to the different containers. Most enterprises deliver waste suitable for incineration in addition to one or more other fractions. Similarly, paper/cardboard or construction waste is often delivered.

Previous studies have shown that most small enterprises that dispose of their waste in containers located at the enterprise only separate the waste into three fractions or less. This study shows, however, that enterprises often deliver more fractions at the civic amenity site than the number of containers available for source separation at the enterprise.

This indicates that the "small" waste fractions would not have been separated into individual fractions, if the enterprise had not visited the civic amenity site. The use of civic amenity sites thus motivates enterprises to separate their waste into more fractions – among other things because the enterprises dispose of small amounts of waste at the civic amenity site that would otherwise have remained unseparated.

The study shows that the site staff generally endeavours to make a visit at the civic amenity site a positive experience – and guides the users during their visit. They seek to avoid control, reprimands or dismissal of the visitors..

It is believed that a number of commercial users present themselves as private users in order to avoid payment at civic amenity sites where commercial users pay upon entry with a card or token. This assumption is supported by the fact that frequency of visits by commercial users is lower at the civic amenity sites that charge a fee from commercial users, but not for private users.

Often, the site staff refers to a "vague borderline" between what is waste from private and commercial users. Borderline cases are often settled to the advantage of enterprises, but they contribute to raising doubt about the sufficiency of the rules in force.

The location is the most important factor governing the enterprises' choice of civic amenity site. The study indicates that enterprises readily choose alternative sites to save money – or to achieve other advantages – if it does not require additional driving.

In general, commercial users are satisfied with their local civic amenity site. Thus, around 90 per cent of the users in the survey indicate that they are satisfied/very satisfied with the local site. However, a number of critical comments were given as to the price (at the fee-charging sites) and - to some extent - as to opening hours, if the civic amenity site was only open during the morning/noon or afternoon. Apart from the location there are no distinct features relating to the site that are more important than others for the enterprises.