New Bins Delivered in August for South Taranaki Residents

Properties serviced by the South Taranaki District Council’s (STDC) kerbside recycling and rubbish collection will start receiving their new bins over a period of six weeks, with the first being delivered to Eltham and Kaponga residents from Monday 5 August.

Properties will receive:

• One 140 litre red-lidded wheelie bin for general waste (up from 120L)
• One 240 litre yellow-lidded wheelie bin for mixed recycling (up from 140L)
• One blue glass recycling crate
• One 23 litre food scraps bin

The new bins are being delivered following the appointment of a new waste contractor, Waste Management NZ, who start the new service on 1 October.

“As you can imagine, dropping off a set of four bins to nearly 9,000 properties all over our District is quite a big job and will take some time to complete,” says STDC works delivery manager, Rahul Sharma. “Because of this, our new contractor will be delivering the bins over the next six weeks so that everyone has theirs before 1 October, when the new service starts. This does mean some residents will need to store their new bins for up to two months.”

“We know that this could be a bit of a challenge for some residents who won’t necessarily have a lot of space, but we ask people to do their best during this time. We have tried to make the delivery timeframe as short as possible, given the logistical challenges.”

“When you get your bins, be sure to have a look inside your food scraps bin, as you’ll find an information guide to the collection service as well as a calendar that’ll help you with the changes once 1 October rolls around.”

Sharma says Council’s current waste contractor (EnviroNZ) will collect the old bins, which they own, sometime after the new service starts on 1 October.

“EnviroNZ are working on a plan to collect all the old bins and we’ll let residents know about how this will work closer to the time.”

What you need to know:

• The delivery of the new bins to serviced properties starts on Monday 5 August and will continue for six weeks until 13 September.
• Four new bins will be delivered to your kerbside.
• Each bin has your address clearly labelled, so please keep an eye out for these and bring them onto your property as soon as possible and keep them safe until you need to start using them from Tuesday 1 October.
• Click here to find out what week your delivery will be.

Background:

Last year Council reviewed its kerbside collection service prior to tendering for a new contract starting in October 2024.

Public consultation was undertaken which covered changing bin sizes, weekly or fortnightly collections and introducing a food scraps service.

777 submissions were received with the public split near even 50/50 between those wanting weekly and fortnightly collection.

“It wasn’t an easy decision but ultimately, we felt the fortnightly option provided the best balance between keeping costs down (fortnightly was considerably cheaper than weekly collection) while encouraging people to reduce waste and send less waste to landfill,” says South Taranaki Mayor Phil Nixon. “We are simply sending too much waste to landfill, which is not sustainable either environmentally or financially.”