All buildings in the emirate will soon be charged a new fee of US$21.78 per tonne for general waste disposal, which is proposed to go up by US$2.72 per annum to US$27.23 per tonne by 2020 and more beyond, according to Dubai Municipality (DM)
However, by segregating their waste, many building owners or management companies can save up to 62 per cent of their waste management tipping fees, the discounts for which are applied by DM at the point of landfill.
?Making a rough estimate, let?s say approximately 100 office workers are employed on each floor of a 20-storey building, or guests in the case of a hotel, each generating 2.3kg of general waste each day, costing US$21.78 ? US$27.23 per tonne, over a three-year period. That works out to US$36482.84 in year one, US$41111.26 in year two and US$45739.68 in year three, potentially a total of US$123333.78.?
?Removing bins and replacing them with a central recycling facility, makes staff more aware of the amount of waste they produce and with the appropriate training, encourages them to give greater consideration to what they actually throw away, reducing waste and enhancing recycling efforts,? said Markus Oberlin, CEO of Farnek, facilities management service provider across the UAE.
He noted, ?Companies and hotels adopting a waste management strategy based on reduce, reuse and recycle, should achieve significant cost-savings, those that don?t may find that a policy of disregard and dispose, simply leads to financial dismay and a negative effect on the environment.?
?However, you must be able to measure and benchmark your waste performance, otherwise you cannot manage it,? Oberlin further added.
The ?pay as you throw? waste fee introduced by DM, will be brought in on 17 May 2018. It will be applicable to the waste generated by commercial establishments, factories, private and public institutions as well as residential communities and freehold properties belonging to developers that are served by private waste collection companies.
The new tipping fee will be charged to waste management companies that provide collection, transport and tipping services on a contractual basis. These companies will in turn charge building owners and management companies for the turnkey service.
