THE bin collection revolution is set to begin next week. Once-a-week collections will be scrapped this week - and North Herts District Council hopes the new scheme will encourage an increase in recycling. But it admits there will need to be a cultural

THE bin collection revolution is set to begin next week.

Once-a-week collections will be scrapped this week - and North Herts District Council hopes the new scheme will encourage an increase in recycling.

But it admits there will need to be a cultural change in residents' approach to bin collections.

The district council will introduce on an alternate weeks basis waste week and recycling week.

Waste week will see the collection the current grey bin, which will be used for household.

Recycling week will be for the collection of kerbside boxes and brown compost bins.

John Robinson, the district council's strategic director (customer services) said: "Waste has become a growing problem."

He said the district council had to change its approach to dealing with rubbish.

"Throwing rubbish away every day is throwing energy away, and throwing energy away is throwing money away," he said.

Mr Robinson said, too, that the new scheme needed to be introduced because the council had to meet "a complex system" of targets and legislation.

One particular problem would be the year-on-year increase in costs is using landfill sites for rubbish.

In Herfordshire, the use of landfill sites is expected to cost £50 million-a-year at the end of this year, and it is estimated that it will reach £70 million in 2010.

Cllr Lynda Needham, the council's portfolio holder on environment and waste, said the whole question of rubbish disposal was becoming "an expensive exercise".

One landfill site will be closing at the end of the year and Herts County Council is currently looking at using land at Westmill.

"There are limits on sending waste to landfill and going over those limits will mean the council paying a penalty," she said.

Cllr Needham had warned in May that unless the council contained its cost on waste disposal then cuts in other services may come about in a bid to balance the budget.

Money saved from waste collections is being used to cover the costs of recycling initiatives such as the kerbside boxes and plastic bottle bins.

Cllr Needham said the council had search "high and low" to see whether once-a-week bin collections could be retained, but at the end of the day the new scheme was seen as "a positive move".

She said then: "We realise that people don't like change."

A council survey showed that across North Herts there was "strong support" for an increase in recycling, and a county council survey showed "overwhelming support" for recycling.

And the Local Government Association has revealed, too, that councils that had dropped once-a-week bin collections had achieved higher recycling rates.