Waste generation and resource recovery in Australia

c)Trends by jurisdiction

Table shows trends in organics recovery in states and territories reported in ROU surveys. ROU surveys do not include recovery of paper products, landfill biogas energy recovery, and energy recovery from timber, but do include recovery of some primary production wastes not included part of the scope of this report. This is why the total organics figures shown differ from those estimated in Table and Table . However, because the ROU surveys have used a consistent auditing method, they provide useful data for monitoring trends in organics management.
Table : Trends in organics recovery based on ROU surveys, 2005/06 to 2010/11

State /territory	2005/06	2006/07	2007/08	2008/09		2009/10	2010/11	% increase
	Kilotonnes
ACT and NSW	1,660	1,828	1,646	1,594		1,808	1,789	8%
Qld	1,179	1,794	1,613	1,702		1,997	2,173	84%
SA	566	628	628	633		679	637	13%
VIC	379	379	n/a	728		628	999	164%
WA	579	542	598	621		696	733	27%
TOTAL	4,363	5,170	4,485	5,279		5,809	6,331	45%
% increase from 2005/06		19%	n/a	21%		33%	45%
% increase from previous year		19%	n/a			10%	9%

n/a = Not available. Data for Vic were not reported for the 2007/2008 year.
This shows that, over the six-year period from 2005/06 to 2010/11:

There have been fairly consistent organics recovery in the ACT and NSW and modest increases in WA and SA. Effective recovery systems were well established prior to 2005/06, and the major recovery operations were included in surveys from that period onwards.

There have been significant increases in recovery in Qld and Vic. To some extent, this reflects improved performance of recovery systems, but it may be partly due to improved data capture.

Nationally, the reported levels of recovered organics increased by 45%.

d)Products and markets

The ROU surveys gather information about the products made from recovered organics and the markets into which these are sold. Data are aggregated, so it is not possible to differentiate between products made from organic wastes from MSW, C&I and C&D sources and those from primary industry. The market data collected are measured by volume (m³) rather than by tonne.
summarises production and sales of materials from the ROU Survey for 2009/10, the last year for which this detailed information was available at the time of writing.
Figure : Production and sales of recycled organics products (2009/10)

Source: ROU 2010
Figure and Figure show the breakdown of products made from recovered organics (excluding manures and direct application to land) and the markets into which the products are sold.

Figure : Breakdown of products made from recovered organics (excluding manures and direct application to land)

Figure : Breakdown of markets for recycled organic products (excluding manures and direct application to land)

The figures above show:

Other than paper products and organics in landfill from which biogas energy is recovered, most recovered organics are converted into:

mulch (sales of 2.6 million m³/yr), mostly ‘raw’ mulch in the form of timber and bark-derived landscaping product

soil conditioner (sales of 1.4 million m³/yr.)

Almost 700,000 m³ /yr of processed recycled organics are used in the production of manufactured soils and a further and over 600,000 m³/yr is used in potting mixes.

Manure-derived products, organic fertilisers and direct land application of organics account for about 1.4 million m³/yr out of a total of 7.1 million m³/yr of recycled organic products.

Urban amenity markets are the main market for products, absorbing 56% or 3.2 million m³/yr of the total 5.7 million m³/yr of recycled organic products (excluding manure-derived products and direct application to land). Other markets for products are intensive agriculture (480,000 m³/yr or 8%), extensive agriculture (180,000 m3/yr or 3%) and rehabilitation and eco-remediation (280,000m³ or 5%).

About 28% of sales are of products not allocated to a specific market. It is likely most of these sales are to the urban amenity market, with a lesser amount to intensive agriculture. Urban amenity market probably account for 65–70% of annual sales of recycled organic products by volume.

At the time of the ROU survey, respondents had in the order of 3.3 million m³ on site. This is not surprising because many processes (such as composting) require materials to be processed for weeks. In addition, sales are typically seasonal and it is possible for sites to hold up to 50% annual inputs on site at some times of the year.