Australia '10 years behind the UK' in waste and landfill management

Australia is significantly behind the UK when it comes to managing its waste and landfill operations, it has been claimed.

Peter Jones, adviser to the City of London on waste management services, stated that Australia is up to ten years behind the UK and the country must make efforts to increase landfill taxes.

By hiking landfill tax - which currently stands at AU$50 (£24) per tonne - he added that Australia can turn the situation around fairly quickly by researching alternative waste disposal methods.

He commented: "Because landfill is the cheapest kid on the block if you don't tax it […] most of these advanced technologies that we're looking at, you really need gate fees of $120-$150 a tonne."

Elsewhere, landfill sites in India could provide the key to stemming the country's energy deficits and two organisations, the Center for Air Quality Studies at the Texas Transportation Institute and India's National Environmental Engineering Research Institute, are collaborating to explore channeling methane emitted by them.