1800-1892
Scotland was comprised of various municipalities: Royal Burghs, Burghs of Regality, Burghs of Barony, Police Burghs, Counties, Counties of Cities, all with varying powers.
Until 1868, Glasgow used Contractors to collect and dispose of their waste, then recruited their own staff and employees to do the job.
1892-1897
The Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1892 regularised the Burghs, Cities and Counties not only in terms of their structure but also their powers including the collection and disposal of waste in their area. The Act however allowed discretion and in some Counties, there was no household waste collection service in the rural areas (in Ayr County, this arrangement continued until 1975). The Act also stated that all waste (including horse dung on the carriageways) belonged to the Council, possibly prompted by stories that in the 1870s, Paisley’s scavengers sometimes had to fight the public to take their rubbish away.
The Public Health (Scotland) Act 1897 gave the authorities additional powers (including the definition of a ‘Nuisance’ and what could be done to remedy it).
1900
By now incineration was commonly used for the treatment of municipal waste prior to couping the clinker (the term ‘landfill’ wouldn’t come into common usage until the middle of the 20th century, most probably imported for the USA where it was known as ‘sanitary landfill’.)
The four cities (Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen) had invested heavily as had many of the Burghs (both ‘Large Burghs’ – >20,000 population, or ‘Small Burghs’ – <20,000 population).
By 1900, Glasgow had built Govan Refuse Power Works, the largest waste incinerator of its time, burning over 200,000 tons/annum. The heat produced was used to generate electricity to charge their fleet of seventy 7 ton Garrett RCVs and other vehicles. Any surplus electricity was sold to the Corporation’s Electricity Department.
Edinburgh Corporation had an extensive complex at Powderhall and Dundee had developed the facility the successor of which is still in operation today.
However, it should be remembered that horses still played a big part in the collection and transport of waste. Alexander Findlay rose to the rank of Police Inspector before becoming Cleansing and Carting Superintendent for Aberdeen Corporation in 1897. He won a celebrated defamation action in 1911 when he was wrongly accused by an Aberdeen Joiner of paying over the odds for Corporation horses.
Although the waste was composed mostly of ash and cinder, household stoves and open grates offered low levels of combustion efficiency and the ashes and cinders had sufficient calorific value to generate heat when incinerated. The waste was very dense with little paper, glass, metal or textile content (due to the informal reuse/repair/recycle customs of the time: eg rag and bone men, tinkers etc) Nor did it have any plastic content.
1900-1950
An Act to tighten up Local Government was introduced in 1949. It had little if any impact on the waste management industry but introduced new Town & Country Planning powers.
By now, many of the Small Burghs had single cell incinerators with little or no gas cleaning. The cell was usually designed to hold a day’s collection tonnage that was set on fire after the daily collection rounds were completed. The cold grates were raked clear of clinker the following morning and the procedure began again. Largs Burgh’s operation was a classic example.
Ayr Burgh had an Incinerator at Walker Road where the collected waste travelled along long picking belts and recyclable/sellable material was removed manually. It was still operating in the late 1960s and provided very grim working conditions for the employees.
1950-60
The enhanced Planning powers in the 1949 Act allowed the municipalities more control over the development of new waste treatment and disposal sites (although existing sites enjoyed ‘Grandfather Rights’: a benefit that many Councils would appreciate and exploit half a century later). Tom Paterson told the story about his Father having secured Planning Consent to extract sand, was dismayed to find it came with a condition that the resultant void had to be ‘backfilled with suitable material.’ When he asked the Planners about a suitable material he was told ‘why not use rubbish?’ And so the family’s landfill at Mount Vernon, Glasgow was born!
The Clean Air Act 1956 brought in ‘Smoke Control Areas’ for Scotland’s towns and cities requiring the traditional open fires in homes to either be converted to burn smokeless fuel (which required more efficient grates) or to other forms of heating (eg town gas, oil or electricity). This meant that more of those rubbish components (paper and wood etc) previously used to kindle the open fires ended up in the domestic stream and this coupled with the introduction of plastic in households products, meant less ash and the loss of a facility to burn unwanted food and combustible waste. It resulted in waste volumes increasing and densities decreasing. Many Councils (eg Ayr County Council) had been using side loaders (with sliding doors) to collect household waste but it was clear that there was a need for a method of compacting the collected waste to get a decent payload. Shelvoke & Drury (S&D) offered the ‘Fore & Aft Tipper’ which was a multi-framed body where after the initial material was dumped in the rear, the body was then hydraulically raised forwards to allow it to self-compact (I had to threaten to discipline one crew at Saltcoats because they were going into the body and dancing on the waste when it was tipped forward to improve compaction!)
Hangar/Eagle Engineering (the precursor for today’s Dennis Eagle Company) introduced a body (the ‘Compressmore’) that had a massive internal paddle that hydraulically compacted the collected waste.
Glover Webb & Liversidge developed a body that had compaction equipment inside the collection hopper and another that used an archemedian screw to achieve the same purpose and most of the other manufacturers also went down this route.
1960-70
The changes in household waste composition had significant consequences for treatment and disposal. The increasing amount of plastic meant that in incinerators, flue gases was very corrosive and damaging to the cleaning arrangements required to comply with the new Clean Air legislation (a further Clean Air in 1968 effectively applied the requirements of the 1956 Act to industrial premises). At the same time, leachate from landfills was producing increased levels of BoD5 and NH3 that exceeded the parameters set by Scotland’s River Purification Boards so there was a move to closing down most of the incinerators in the Small Burghs and closing landfills that produced leachates in nature and quantities that were too expensive to treat. We were spoiled to some extent in Saltcoats as our landfill was on a raised beach deposit where the leachate drained off with no perceptible indication of where it went!
In 1967, a Report was published by a Committee Chaired by Jim Sumner (CIWM President the same year) that recommended far-ranging changes to the provision of waste treatment and disposal in the UK. The Report was to be the basis for the Control of Pollution Act 1974 and included such measures as: a requirement on Councils to ensure they made adequate provision for all wastes arising in their areas; and all waste treatment and disposal sites (existing and proposed) had to be Licensed by the Council. Unless the site had a relative Planning Consent, it couldn’t be Licensed but Councils couldn’t refuse to License a site if it had Planning Consent but could apply appropriate Conditions to any Licence issued; the relevant Water Authority (the River Purification Boards in Scotland) were Statutory Consultees before any Licence could be issued.
Towards the end of the decade, Glasgow Corporation still operated the Govan Incinerator (without heat recovery), a multi-cell incinerator at Polmadie, and incinerators at Queenslie and Dawsholm.
Some Councils offered a separate collection of paper and cardboard from commercial premises. It was baled and sold to the paper mills but the prices paid varied widely as the market was affected by a ‘hunger or burst’ phenomenon where voluntary groups (eg Scouts) collected paper and cardboard when the price was high, resulting in a glut in supply that allowed the mills to drop the price and it wasn’t unknown for a Scout Leader to phone the local Cleansing Manager to say his garage was full of paper and cardboard that he couldn’t get rid of and could they take it away for him?
Towards the end of the decade Barbara Castle’s Transport Act introduced a requirement for a new ‘Operators’ Licence’ with all refuse collection, trucks and skip vehicles having to undergo annual MoT testing, as well as three new grades of HGV Licences (until then anybody over 21 who held a ‘Full’ driving Licence could drive a truck). The Act provided for ‘Grandfather Rights’ but these were qualified by the number of vehicles in the fleet: eg if you had five trucks, only 10 of your drivers could claim an HGV Licence, the rest having to take a (rigorous) 2 hour driving test.
A few Councils (including Kilmarnock, Paisley and Dumbarton) had invested in the ‘Dano’ composting system of waste treatment that involved adding copious amounts of water to the waste in a large revolving cylinder that ‘encouraged’ the heavier components to break down the more softer elements. It produced a product with a tonnage that exceed the input tonnage by as much as 10-15% but could be landfilled more easily than untreated refuse. However the screenings from it produced a product that when leached, generated very high BoD5 levels and the system was very expensive to run. Other Councils used hammer-mill pulverisers to reduce volume prior to landfilling but by the end of the decade there was so much paper content in the input tonnage that the resultant product was prone to fires when landfilled and required cover material (one of the system’s original selling points was that it wouldn’t need cover material.)
The Dano experiment didn’t catch on all that much as the Kilmarnock plant was sold for scrap after the Director left to join Paisley Burgh (where he bought another Dano). After he retired from Renfrew DC in 1986, his replacement sold it to a company who shipped it out to Karachi (they’d also bought the Dumbarton Dano unit). Oddly enough, Cunninghame DC had bought a Dano in 1982 and installed it at Shewalton, outside Irvine.
Towards the end of the decade some Councils began introducing separate collections for bulky household waste and summer garden refuse collections.
The Civic Amenity Act 1967 required all Councils to set up places where the public could bring household waste for free disposal.
1970-80
The changes in the composition of municipal; waste led to the gradual replacement of galvanised dustbins with a sack system (either paper or plastic) as it allowed those Councils who provided a back door collections system to reduce the number of trips (and in turn crew sizes). This also coincided with a move to introduce incentive bonus schemes to improve the remuneration of cleansing workers.
In 1972, a load of barrels containing cyanide was dumped in a disused brickwork in the midlands. The Chair of NAWDC was outraged and demanded all efforts be made to ‘catch the culprits’ only to be humiliated within the week when the load was traced to one of his company’s (Redland Purle) drivers. New legislation was rushed through Parliament (The Deposit of Poisonous Waste Act 1972) that required any specified waste to be ‘notified’ by the Producer of its nature and quantity, the carrier, and where it was destined for treatment/disposal. The Notification recipients included the Council in whose area the waste was produced, the Council in whose area it was to be disposed of, and the relevant River Purification Boards(s). Councils and the RPBs had powers to stop movements they considered unsuitable.
The introduction of the Control of Pollution Act 1974 coupled with the Health & Safety Act 1974 impacted on waste services with RCVs no longer being allowed to have rear steps to allow loaders to travel a short distance from one street to another.
By the middle of the decade, Glasgow had replaced the Polmadie Incineration units with a High Density baling unit (based on the equipment used to crush car bodies). The bales had SG>1 and were self-retaining (unlike conventional baling (<1) that required wiring as they’d installed at Queesnlie Depot). Both types of bales were then stacked in landfills, ensuring maximum payloads for transfer loading and (arguably) less cover material. At the same time they’d also installed a direct incineration facility at Dawsholm Depot.
In 1975, Scottish local Government was reorganised, resulting in 53 District Councils, 9 Regional Councils and 3 Islands Unitary Councils. The District Councils were encouraged to set up Environmental Health Departments (with the option of a separate Cleansing Department that all the cities and some of the larger Councils took up). Apart from one District Council (Ross & Cromarty whose new Chief Executive was of the view that his Directors didn’t need to know anything about the Department they were running) they all appointed Directors who were qualified EHOs, with many having the Institute’s Testamur (by now its name had changed to Institute of Wastes Management) to run their Cleansing Services. A few of the new Councils had ‘inherited’ waste treatment and/or landfills that were outdated and a few (Eastwood DC initially, then Hamilton DC and Kilmarnock & Loudoun DC) looked to the private sector for an alternative to in-house disposal. This resulted in the growth of the ‘transfer loading/disposal contract’ concept with Shanks & McEwan (Northern) Ltd and PD Beatwaste Ltd offering to design, build and operate Transfer Stations, provide haulage and disposal facilities for their customers. At the time, the maximum GVW for trucks was 32 tonnes, so the methodology meant installing compaction equipment and closed containers at the Transfer Station to ensure maximum payloads. The arrangement allowed the Contractor to develop larger landfills some distance from the Councils’ areas.
1980-90
Although it had worked reasonably well, the Deposit of Poisonous Waste 1972 was replaced by the Special Waste Regulations in 1981 that more or less tweaked some issues in the original Act.
New Road traffic legislation in the decade increased the maximum GVW to 38 tonnes and some of the companies providing transfer loading services moved away from compaction to larger capacity high-sided trailers with moving floors.
Bottle banks started to appear in the forecourts of supermarkets, and in public car parks
By 1982, wheeled bins were being introduced in the UK (led by Bury Council) and came into Scotland with Dunfermline DC among the leaders. The system effectively transferred the responsibility for getting household waste from the rear to the kerbside (and returning the empty container) from the Council to the householder. This allowed further reductions in crew sizes (eg Driver + four loaders to Driver + two loaders) and the resultant savings in employee costs were used to pay for the capital costs of the new bins. However, the existing RCVs had to have bin-lifting equipment retro-fitted. The bins also drastically reduced the number of accidents (mostly cuts to hands and limbs, and lifting injuries) for the crews. An unexpected consequence was that as the new 240l bin held the equivalent of 3-4 binbags, many householders filled their new bins to the brim resulting in collection round tonnages increasing by as much as 20%.
Perhaps the biggest issue however was the impending Thatcher Government’s legislation to require Compulsory Competitive Tendering (CCT) for specified Council Services): refuse collection, street cleansing, vehicle maintenance, and grounds maintenance. Councils had to prepare schedules of the work these services delivered and had to invite tenders from the private sector as well as submitting their own bids. The Government believed that the private sector could deliver these services at a lower cost. The legislation however didn’t impact as was intended. Glasgow appointed a Director of Cleansing from another Council (rather than their usual internal promotion arrangements that had gone on for decades) who immediately streamlined the Department (as did many other Councils). The only Council that was unable to submit a bid lower than the private sector was Skye & Lochalsh and in the five years they had it, the successful Contractor didn’t make any profit whatsoever and asked to be released from the contract at least once during its lifetime (the request was denied). One bizarre outcome was when a Regional Council intimated its intention to bid for a District Council’s Vehicle Maintenance Contract, a move that caused rancour for a few years afterwards.
Around the middle of the decade, the UK began to get representations from the EEC asking why it hadn’t adopted their Landfill Directive? They argued that as landfill costs in the UK were far lower than those on the continent, the UK could offer lower disposal costs and it was unfair. The Scottish reply was that we had enough difficulties securing the development of new landfills for our own waste without thinking about importing more. By now, Strathclyde RC’s Planners had set up the ‘Strathclyde Advisory Group on Waste Disposal’: an ad hoc Committee that was supposed to identify and coordinate more options for joint working among the 19 District Councils. Apart from seeing off the EEC, it was usually a good morning out away from one’s desk.
1990-2000
Around 1991, new legislation required Councils to keep separate financial accounts for their commercial waste collection services, a response to a claim from the private sector that Councils were unfairly subsidising these services. In actual fact it had little impact as the Councils’ charges were based on marginal costings: eg if a RCV was going along a street collecting domestic waste, the extra cost of emptying the bins at a nearby shop weren’t all that significant.
The EEC was back with another approach that the UK accept their Landfill Directive: this time that our landfills were generating too much methane and polluting the atmosphere. We replied that after an explosion caused by methane migrating from a landfill into site accommodation, every landfill now had gas capture systems and was used to generate electricity.
Around 1991/2 the author (representing CIWM) and Kenneth Morin, MD of Shanks & McEwan (Northern) approached the University of Strathclyde with a view to Shanks providing funding (for 5 years) for a Chair in Waste Management. Prof McGown, Chair of the Civil Engineering Department was very receptive and confirmed that after five years, the University would fund the new Chair. The proposal was then submitted to the main Shanks Board. Unfortunately the incoming Chair of the Civil Engineering Department felt this new Chair would ‘interfere with his landfill Consultancy’ (actually some dabbling that hadn’t earned him all that great a reputation) but it is understood he’d briefed a Shanks Main Board Director that it ‘wasn’t a good idea.’
However, everything changed when PM John Major signed off the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 because it included the agreement that the UK would accept and implement the EU (as it now was) Landfill Directive that specified staged reductions in the tonnages the UK could landfill with the final reduction being that of 65% of current tonnages.
It was clear that there was little chance of complying with the Directive as things currently stood as the prevailing landfill disposal costs made waste recycling a financial impossibility so the concept of a Landfill Tax was developed: a fiscal intervention that would artificially increase the cost of landfill to make recycling more financially viable.
In 1996, Scottish local government was reorganised again with the 53 District Councils being merged with the 9 Regional Councils to form 29 Unitary Councils (Western Isles, Orkney Isles, and Shetlands Isles Councils had been Unitary Authorities since 1975).
It had different impacts on different areas: the 19 former District Councils in the former Strathclyde Region merged into 12 Councils; the 8 in Highland merged into a single Council; while others (including Cunninghame, Stirling, Falkirk and Moray) retained the same area but with additional powers added from the former respective Regional Council.
In some cases it allowed a rationalisation and calibration of waste management services.
At the same time, the Councils’ waste management regulatory powers were transferred to a new national body (SEPA) who also took over the staff and powers of the former River Purification Boards.
Around this time, Shanks & McEwan revisited their idea of a Chair in Waste Management using their Landfill Tax credits and agreed that Professor Jim Baird at Glasgow Caledonian University was best-placed to set up a new group (The Caledonian Shanks Centre) to explore new ways of improving waste recycling (based on the ‘Clean Washington’ model). After a shaky start, CEC began to make its presence felt in the Scottish Waste Industry.
In 1997, the new Blair Administration replaced the CCT legislation with ‘Best Value’: where Councils had to demonstrate that the cost of delivering their inhouse services was comparable with private sector operations.
Due to the 1996 reorganisation, the complexity of combining several former District Councils, and the creation of SEPA, no creditable records of the quantities of waste landfilled in 1996 were available. As this would be the baseline for calculating Scotland’s waste diversion targets (now SEPA’s responsibility) it was clear that the ‘best estimate’ approach would be required, but eventually some figures were released that set out the targets for compliance with the Directive. The race was now on to find a way to meet these targets.
As the effects of the Landfill Tax began to impact on the new Councils’ waste treatment and disposal costs the new Scottish Parliament (created in 1999) was faced with the reality that complying with the EU Landfill Directive would mean a massive injection of both capital and revenue funding.
2000-2010
It was decided to produce a National Waste Strategy for Scotland and SEPA was tasked with coordinating groups of Councils to work together to improve municipal waste recycling and develop new waste treatment plants. Some of the groupings (such as Ayrshire, Dumfries & Galloway) raised a few eyebrows as although the senior Waste Management Officers of the three Ayrshire Councils had known each other professionally for decades, their counterpart at Dumfries & Galloway was unknown to them and it became apparent that the options for joint working in terms of treatment and disposal were very limited. Even then, the three Ayrshire Councils wished to continue with their individual recycling strategies (North Ayrshire Council was still using the Dano plant at Shewalton).
The Scottish Parliament set up a Challenge Fund where Councils could bid for ring-fenced funding to buy new vehicles and equipment to source-separate, collect and treat household waste as well as recruiting additional employees. Fortuitously Prof Jim Baird (by now the Group was called the Caledonian Environment Centre) had developed a Model that could predict the costs of implementing and running the new kerbside collection services involved and the Scottish Parliament Officials were happy to accept bids from individual (and groups of) Councils for funding based on Jim’s model.
The outcome saw Scotland’s municipal waste recycling performances soar from around 5% on 2000 to around 45% by 2006.
However a change of Administration at Holyrood in 2007 resulted in the ring-fence on the Strategic Waste Fund being removed and Councils were now allowed to spend the money on other projects. Sadly this resulted in Scotland’s recycling rate remaining unchanged nearly two decades later.
Around 2009, a new Dean of Faculty at Glasgow University wanted to ‘take it in another direction’ and the Caledonian Environment Centre was wound down. It coincided with overtures from the Scottish Government of their intention to set up a new organisation (Zero Waste Scotland) that would continue the work of CEC as well as undertake research.
2010-2020
ZWS set up
2020- 2026
Landfill Ban
DRS
Written by John Ferguson, Life Member CIWM