Village greening

Locals press forward on waste elimination, parish hall retrofits

St Arvans, two miles outside Chepstow, has set itself the target of becoming the first zero-waste Welsh community. Residents already recycle an impressive average 77% of waste with the help of weekly collections by Monmouthshire Community Recycling (MCR), a social enterprise established by local people. By introducing new collections for organic waste and household items such as batteries and toner cartridges, they now aim to cut out refuse entirely.

According to the Local Government Association, UK households send more than 26.8 million tonnes of rubbish to landfill every year – nearly half a tonne per person. However, David Roman, executive director at MCR, believes the drive for zero waste encourages people to cut out waste at source: “The schemes are helping residents think about their consumption; we’re seeing a great deal of support for the campaign to make Chepstow plastic bag free.”

A short hop over the border into Gloucestershire, the village of Highnam recently became the first recipient of the free site surveys offered under a new scheme for community buildings with a view to improving energy efficiency. The village hall will get a ground source heat pump thanks to the scheme, run by Tewkesbury Borough Council and the Severn Wye Energy Agency.

Another six sites have already been visited, and Alistair Stevens, project manager at the Agency, says that “we have identified at least one good candidate for solar PV energy, one for solar thermal, one for a small wind turbine, and one for biomass wood-chip heating.”
– Jon Wallace

25 March 2008

Jon Wallace