Chamber and committees

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Parliamentary questions can be asked by any MSP to the Scottish Government or the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The questions provide a means for MSPs to get factual and statistical information.

Written questions must be answered within 10 working days (20 working days during recess)
Other questions such as Topical, Portfolio, General and First Minister's Question Times are taken in the Chamber

Urgent Questions aren't included in the Question and Answers search. There is a SPICe fact sheet listing Urgent and emergency questions.

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Question reference: S2W-32501

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 29 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive what percentage of household waste was recycled by each local authority in the most recent period for which information is available.

Question reference: S2W-32499

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 29 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive when the outline business cases of the (a) Lothians and Borders and (b) North and South Lanarkshire strategic options review groups on National Waste Plan funding will be published and whether there will be any public consultation before decisions are reached.

We have requested that Outline BusinessCases from both groups of local authorities are submitted by 30 September 2007. They will be published shortly after that with commercially confidential informationremoved.

The indicative funding awards to the groups include conditionsto ensure full public participation, taking account of any obligations which mayarise under Strategic Environmental Assessment legislation. In addition, the OutlineBusiness Cases must represent the Best Practicable Environmental Option (BPEO).

Question reference: S2W-32502

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive what total amount of waste, including waste recycled, was handled by each local authority in each year from 1999 to 2006.

Scottish Environment Protection Agencydata for the amount of waste handled by each local authority is detailed in thefollowing table. Figures for 1999 are not available

Local Authority	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06
Aberdeen	123,973	119,548	145,429	133,688	131,828	140,064
Aberdeenshire	132,527	115,837	149,626	144,203	150,819	155,123
Angus	68,897	64,137	73,650	76,032	77,264	73,381
Argyll and Bute	71,539	64,725	65,975	64,746	62,982	67,582
Clackmannanshire	31,956	33,230	34,423	37,017	35,052	40,919
Dumfries and Galloway	87,182	89,438	85,653	91,993	110,328	108,353
Dundee	91,334	98,418	102,290	96,109	100,260	95,669
East Ayrshire	64,856	67,444	81,804	81,078	81,077	72,083
East Dunbartonshire	64,203	69,824	68,301	68,718	73,119	73,646
East Lothian	55,305	58,416	60,518	63,975	65,638	69,634
East Renfrewshire	50,286	53,434	57,889	59,515	58,550	58,144
Edinburgh	257,367	252,383	257,796	262,585	267,130	278,538
Eilean Siar	28,410	23,925	21,963	21,794	22,781	23,126
Falkirk	110,870	119,875	122,537	108,898	112,396	140,000
Fife	253,443	251,914	260,836	252,262	263,840	293,046
Glasgow	354,549	397,684	360,576	362,608	386,566	418,688
Highland	164,492	139,228	142,559	149,559	158,654	161,249
Inverclyde	47,243	43,914	49,230	51,273	50,798	52,061
Midlothian	49,527	55,638	55,650	54,103	54,955	52,678
Moray	59,200	63,751	63,708	67,159	71,026	65,233
North Ayrshire	76,800	89,224	82,171	82,752	83,730	87,230
North Lanarkshire	191,357	183,410	208,706	195,337	217,616	231,898
Orkney Islands	11,021	11,580	14,590	13,050	16,750	17,947
Perth and Kinross	93,149	94,791	98,172	95,977	100,436	103,231
Renfrewshire	108,397	101,356	106,957	110,133	129,521	118,605
Scottish Borders	63,597	69,368	69,919	67,938	80,021	104,445
Shetland Islands	11,010	12,207	12,886	13,570	14,407	13,186
South Ayrshire	83,108	76,870	77,100	87,033	79,875	78,799
South Lanarkshire	191,592	207,059	172,512	178,373	204,443	202,940
Stirling	62,142	76,857	83,959	59,384	62,407	61,227
West Dunbartonshire	57,691	58,823	58,376	59,589	64,255	61,279
West Lothian	94,410	102,388	99,696	106,600	117,935	138,079
Total	3,211,434	3,266,696	3,345,457	3,317,051	3,506,460	3,658,084

Question reference: S2W-32500

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive when its decisions on each of the strategic outline cases on National Waste Plan funding, published in May 2006, will be made public.

I announced the way forward for implementationof phase 2 of the National Waste Plan on 14 March 2007. This announcement outlined the position for local authorities in terms of recycling/compostingrates which should be achieved, new treatment capacity for residual waste and indicativefunding for treatment facilities.

The total maximum capacity for treatment which will receive supportfrom the Strategic Waste Fund is 1.14 million tonnes by 2020. The total amount ofindicative funding to be made available from the Strategic Waste Fund is 48 millionper year (at today’s prices). Two groups of local authorities have received indicativeallocations of tonnages and funding. Further indicative allocations to the remaininglocal authorities will be within the overall capacity and funding parameters andwill be announced at a later date.

Question reference: S2W-32503

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive how much (a) plastic, (b) glass, (c) metal, (d) paper and (e) compostable material was recycled by each local authority in the most recent year for which information is available.

Information on materials recycledand composted by individual local authorities is given in tables 15 and 18 of theScottish Environment Protection Agency’s Waste Data Digest 6. A copy is availableon the Scottish Environment Protection Agency’s website at: http://www.sepa.org.uk/pdf/publications/wds/wdd_6.pdf.

Waste Data Digest 6 relates to 2004 and 2004/2005 wastedata. Waste Data Digest 7 is due out shortly.

Question reference: S2W-32505

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive in which local authority areas there are outline proposals to site thermal waste treatment facilities.

A number of groups of local authoritiessubmitted Strategic Outline Cases which included suggested infrastructurefor treating residual municipal waste. A copy of these Strategic Outline Case,with certain commercially sensitive information removed, can be found on the ScottishExecutive website at:http://search.scotland.gov.uk/search/pages/search/basic.asp?QuerySubmit=true&Paging=true&Page=1&QueryText=strategic+outline+cases.

Following consideration of these StrategicOutline Cases, and draft Outline Business Cases being prepared by theLanarkshire authorities and the Lothian and Borders authorities, I have recentlywritten to all local authorities in Scotland outlining the way ahead on both recyclingand on infrastructure to treat residual waste.

In a number of cases, I have askedlocal authorities to submit Outline Business Cases on residual waste infrastructure.These Outline Business Cases will have to be approved by the Scottishministers ensuring they are in line with our objectives on waste prevention, recyclingand composting, value for money, affordability and deliverability.

The Outline Business Casesshould also contain a value for money assessment of alternative forms of procurement.Subject to the conclusions of these assessments, out expectation is that local authoritieswill issue output based tenders. These will outline the amount of waste authoritieswish to divert away from landfill and seek bids and proposals from contractors onhow to achieve this objective. Proposals from contractors may include thermal treatmentplants.

In addition, developers are, of course, free to put forward theirown proposals for thermal treatment plants.

Question reference: S2W-32504

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive how much waste went to landfill in each year from 1999 to 2006, broken down by local authority area.

Scottish Environment Protection Agencydata for the amount of waste sent to landfill by local authorities from 2000-01to 2005-06 is shown in the following table. Figures for 1999 are not available.

Total Tonnes of Waste Landfilled by Scottish LocalAuthorities (2000-01 to 2005-06)

Local Authority	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06
Aberdeen	119,068	112,782	135,004	121,000	113,356	108,159
Aberdeenshire*	127,632	109,702	135,161	125,685	131,895	129,858
Angus	48,211	35,545	37,171	39,936	39,527	31,947
Argyll and Bute	67,298	58,734	58,554	56,836	51,372	50,348
Clackmannanshire	30,779	31,842	32,121	33,938	21,739	22,141
Dumfries and Galloway	84,163	86,757	82,538	88,289	103,791	92,359
Dundee	64,510	39,943	37,634	35,781	32,236	21,687
East Ayrshire	62,823	64,945	78,225	75,811	67,685	48,356
East Dunbartonshire	61,115	65,030	61,392	57,642	59,260	54,254
East Lothian	53,559	55,190	53,040	54,628	52,333	46,634
East Renfrewshire	46,337	49,426	50,626	46,155	41,889	40,587
Edinburgh	244,297	241,001	240,541	231,300	224,172	204,982
Eilean Siar	28,346	23,270	20,651	19,664	20,396	20,273
Falkirk	104,841	113,582	115,604	96,226	90,877	86,660
Fife	247,793	246,078	247,989	209,455	201,163	185,808
Glasgow	346,316	384,778	343,868	340,083	351,105	340,245
Highland	163,412	135,035	137,258	140,418	144,095	128,997
Inverclyde	46,010	42,371	47,509	48,494	47,276	42,314
Midlothian	48,021	53,629	53,496	51,422	52,183	41,341
Moray	55,713	58,192	54,732	54,870	49,796	42,701
North Ayrshire	71,490	84,280	72,014	65,911	63,988	64,861
North Lanarkshire	189,474	179,046	195,107	170,996	179,033	166,642
Orkney Islands	1,629	1,600	3,438	3,479	3,187	2,255
Perth and Kinross	78,497	80,132	76,900	76,216	73,066	67,307
Renfrewshire	104,440	96,617	98,261	99,178	112,756	93,458
Scottish Borders	58,158	62,586	63,959	60,972	73,682	71,922
Shetland Islands	5,767	2,348	3,965	3,008	3,913	3,090
South Ayrshire	76,019	73,350	73,079	75,672	62,512	51,638
South Lanarkshire	183,133	170,091	163,140	147,175	146,289	135,237
Stirling	57,690	70,477	78,476	51,202	44,201	40,864
West Dunbartonshire	54,296	55,681	54,441	55,264	59,568	49,589
West Lothian	90,679	95,805	92,909	94,582	90,067	81,336
Total	3,021,516	2,979,845	2,998,803	2,831,288	2,808,408	2,567,850

Source: Scottish Environment Protection Agency’s LocalAuthority Waste Arisings Survey.

Note: *Includes In-Vessel Composting (used within landfill).

Question reference: S2W-32506

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 16 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Ross Finnie on 28 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive what studies have been carried out to examine the energy content of residual waste once all cyclables have been removed.

A number of studies have been carriedout on energy and waste. Recent examples include:A study by Oakdene Hollins, on theQuantification of the Potential Energy from Residuals (EfR) in the UK.Table 11 is about the calorific value (energy content) and biodegradability of eachwaste stream in municipal waste. This study can be found at http://www.oakdenehollins.co.uk/renewable-energy.html.

A study for the Department of Environment,Food and Rural Affairs on the Impact of Energy from Waste and Recycling Policyon UK Greenhouse Gas Emissions. Table 1.1 in the annex to this report givesthe calorific values of different types of waste. This study can be found at:

http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/waste/strategy/pdf/ermreport.pdf.

Question reference: S2W-32389

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Wednesday, 14 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Allan Wilson on 22 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive how many representations it received in respect of the Lewis Wind Power application for a wind farm on Lewis (a) during the formal consultation period and (b) in total and, of these, how many were (i) in support of and (ii) opposed to the application.

In addition to the Lewis WindPower application, there were two addenda submitted by the developer. These attracted10,234 representations in total, up to the last consultation date of 5 February2007

An overall total of 11,456 representationshave been received so far, including 1,222 representations received after the 5February deadline.

From the total number of representationsreceived, 59 were recorded in support and 11,397 against the development.

Question reference: S2W-32199

Asked by: Shiona Baird, MSP for North East Scotland, Scottish Green Party
Date lodged: Friday, 02 March 2007
Current Status: Answered by Tavish Scott on 22 March 2007

To ask the Scottish Executive, further to the answer to question S2W-31789 by Tavish Scott on 1 March 2007, of the 987 members of the public who corresponded with the Executive on the Aberdeen Western Peripheral Route between 1 February 2006 and 31 January 2007, how many were in favour and how many were opposed.