South Ayrshire Council estimates that bringing energy-from-waste plants into the UK Emissions Trading Scheme could create an additional annual waste cost of between £590,000 and £1.04 million from 2028.
The estimate appears in the midpoint review of the council’s 2021–2031 Waste Strategy considered by Cabinet on 22 September.
South Ayrshire sent around 22,000 tonnes of residual waste for disposal in the baseline calculation. Using an assumption of roughly half a tonne of fossil-derived carbon dioxide for every tonne burned, the council estimates that waste would create about 11,000 tonnes of chargeable fossil CO2. The final cost will depend on carbon allowance prices.
The review also shows how the waste system has changed since the strategy began. South Ayrshire and East Ayrshire have a ten-year residual and bulky-waste treatment contract valued at £39 million, while the council has bought the Heathfield waste facility and now sells recovered glass, paper, card and metals rather than paying a contractor to handle all of those streams.
Food remains a significant issue. Earlier composition work found that about 30 per cent of residual-bin material was food, which is particularly expensive to dispose of. Trials increasing separate food-waste participation reduced residual waste on the routes tested.
Of 28 actions in the original strategy, 17 are now recorded as completed. The financial pressure from carbon pricing creates a new incentive for the remaining years: every tonne of fossil-derived material removed from residual waste may eventually reduce both disposal and emissions-trading costs.
