Go Gothenburg, go

Peter Årnes, was working in the waste services department in Gothenburg, Sweden’s second city, in 1996 when he was approached by the municipal waste management board and, as he explains it, told: “We will have a system that can take care of organic waste in a good way. And we will not start with a trial in a small area; we will introduce it all over the city at one time. And it should be done within a year and a half. Please, do it.” Årnes and his team had eighteen short months to work out how to collect and treat organic waste, fund the service, inform the public of the new policy and convince them
to participate.

According to Årnes: “We decided rather early that the main thing should be home composting. But we also knew that in a city like this it would be impractical to have composting bins in small yards [or flats]. So, we understood we also had to have some type of central treatment.” Home composting was considered the best option because, “to get good quality, you have to start as close to the source as possible”. He continues: “Not only is it easier to pick waste out when you have it in the kitchen, but also if you are going to take care of the organic waste yourself and have it in your own yard, you’re going to be more careful of what you put there.”

The city has a population of nearly 500,000, though, and less than half of households have access to a garden, so Årnes et al decided a centralised composting facility with a 50,000-tonne capacity was also needed.

Though the group easily concluded home composting was best, they knew it would be trickier to get the public to go along with it: “To make people change their behaviour, it’s all about money… So, we gave the people three choices. The first choice was collection as it had been – all together. The second choice was separate collection of organic waste. And the third was to home compost. In some municipalities, they decided when they started with biological treatment: ‘This is the system, you have to sort it out in two bins.’ But, in that case, they got much lower quality because if you are forced to do something, you are not so careful.”

Rather than order people to compost, then, Gothenburg enticed them to do so for monetary gain: those who composted would pay roughly half as much as those who put all their waste out for collection; citizens who separated organic waste for collection would pay roughly two-thirds as much.

The group knew that information was “the most important thing” and so educated the public in four ways: they invited householders to meetings for instruction and to give feedback; they disseminated explanatory leaflets; representatives visited homes armed with information and actual waste for purposes of demonstration; and translators visited immigrant households to make sure everyone understood the scheme.

Educational efforts allayed people’s fears about odours and rodents and so, Årnes says: “At first, most people chose to home compost because it was fascinating, it was the cheapest option and they could get better produce in their own yard.” However, some of the initial enthusiasm waned and “many people found out it wasn’t as easy to make good compost as they thought because you had to think a little and be sure you put the right things in there. So, therefore, many chose the collection option instead.” Despite its £15 million price tag, the centralised composting facility had a few “teething problems” of its own, however: the mixing
sticks meant to aerate the waste corroded and people complained about the smell.

Today, other problems have popped up and Gothenburg is still not composting as much as it would like. Nils-Arne Holmlid, PR Manager for the Department of Waste Management, explains: “The problem is usually that the sorted organic waste contains plastic bags and other inappropriate materials that disrupt the process at the central composting facility.” And, whilst over a third of people choose to compost, only 17 per cent send organic waste to the central facility, which it is not operating at full capacity. So, monetary incentives are not convincing nearly half of people to compost even though they would pay only 1,420 SEK (£116) a year for waste services, compared to the full 2,295 SEK (£188).

Gothenburg has not given up the fight, however, and wants to collect more organic waste to feed the anaerobic digestion plant it is planning. The city will also continue its educational campaign and has turned to what Holmlid refers to as ‘unconventional methods’: it “commissioned a theatre group to produce a play for preschool children that explains in a playful and musical manner what compost is and what is involved”. Making a song and dance about composting and hooking children when they’re young might just be the longed-for solution.