The Australian and Victorian governments have announced a combined investment of $15 million for 10 new recycling infrastructure projects in the State.
In a statement, Sustainability Victoria said the grant aims to hasten Victoria’s transition to a sustainable future by boosting local efforts to recycle and repurpose waste materials, including soft plastics and food scraps, that are otherwise destined for the trash.
The grantees announced will receive government funding from three different funds: $11.26 million from the Circular Economy Organics Sector Transformation Fund, $3 million from the Victorian Circular Economy Recycling Modernisation Fund, and $1.175 million from the Circular Economy Infrastructure Fund.
The funded projects will support 190 local employments during construction and an additional 75 ongoing roles.
According to the Victorian Government’s $380 million circular economy policy, an action plan to overhaul the state’s recycling industry, Victoria will reduce waste creation by 15 per cent and the amount of food and organic waste going to landfills by half over the next ten years.
The grant recipients are as follows:
- Central Gippsland Regional Water – $4.8 million to expand an existing facility for processing organic waste to allow for more trash disposal alternatives.
- Cleanaway Solids Waste Pty Ltd – $1.9 million for the conversion of Thurla transfer station into a composting plant to handle neighbourhood Food Organics and Garden Organics (FOGO) garbage.
- Sacyr Environment Australia Pty Ltd – $1.5 million to improve product quality and reduce contamination by upgrading equipment at the Dandenong site.
- Pinegro Products Pty Ltd – $1.1 million to improve the Mt Wallace facility so that it can accept Food Organics and Garden Organics (FOGO) waste.
- Ileowl Pty Ltd (trading as Greenchip Recycling) – $700,000 to develop infrastructure that can add value to fines produced by current composting facilities.
- Manningtree Corporation Pty Ltd – $375,000 to increase capacity at Elmore Compost and Organics.
- Swan Hill Rural City Council – $961,400 to convert the council’s existing open-window composting facility to an in-vessel composting facility.
- IQ Renew Pty Ltd – $3 million for the Victoria Soft Plastics Engineered Commodity (SPEC) Project.
- Upcycled Building Materials Australia Pty Ltd – $1 million for the saveBOARD project, which produces construction materials using plastic packaging and liquid paperboard.
- Manningtree Corporation Pty Ltd – 175,000 for the BioChar Elmore – Reducing Organic Waste to Land Fill Project.
