More food waste bins to be rolled out across county

Almost 13,000 more homes across Cambridgeshire will receive food waste bins from Monday.

Homes across the Cambridge and South Cambridgeshire council districts will get their caddies from the Greater Cambridge Shared Waste service (GCSW).

Each household will receive two caddies — a small one for indoors and a large one for outdoors — as well as a starter roll of liners.

The latest phase brings the number of households with caddies to about 60,500. The councils said more than 2,800 tonnes of food waste had been collected since the roll-out started earlier this year, and it was being used to generate power and create biofertiliser.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said "every household in England" would get weekly food waste collections from March under new legislation.

The government has provided funding for the service.

In Cambridgeshire, collected food waste is taken to anaerobic digestion (AD) plants at March, and at Baldock in Hertfordshire and Thetford in Norfolk, where the biogas given off by the decomposing food is captured and used to generate power.

When fully broken down the food becomes biofertiliser which can be spread on farmland.

The Greater Cambridge Waste Service is a partnership between Cambridge City Council and South Cambridgeshire District Council.

Cabinet member for the environment at South Cambridgeshire, Laurence Damary-Homan, said: "You might think that you don't create any food waste, but even things like teabags, banana peel and onion skins can be included, and it all adds up.

"In fact, recycling food waste is one of the most impactful actions you can do at home as one full caddy could power a TV for two hours."

Do you have a story suggestion for Cambridgeshire? Contact us below.

Follow Cambridgeshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.