Bega Valley Shire Council has received approval from the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) to convert the fire-impacted Cobargo Transfer Station into an engineered landfill site.
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The site, which has remained closed since the Badja Road Fire passed through the area in late December, will be redesigned to enable it to take asbestos and construction and demolition waste from fire-affected properties.
Public Works Advisory (PWA), in consultation with property owners, is leading the clean-up effort with insurers, local government and contractors, to ensure properties are efficiently and safely cleared.
This includes both insured and uninsured properties.
As a result, the new Cobargo landfill will only be open to PWA contractors (not the general public).
Council's acting director of assets and operations Chris Best said this welcome news meant council would be better able to service those whose properties were damaged and destroyed by fire in the northern part of the shire.
"Disposal will be much more efficient and the risks of carting asbestos across the shire or long distances will be minimised," Mr Best said.
"Using the Central Waste Facility at Wanatta Lane simply wasn't a viable option for us as the amount of waste predicted would not only take up but exceed the remaining capacity in the current cell.
"Additionally, this would have resulted in having to ship our kerbside waste collections out of the shire.
"Even with expediated procurement and construction of a new cell we wouldn't have been ready to accept waste until next year - which is clearly not a satisfactory situation.
"The other clear benefit of the solution is that the Cobargo Transfer Station was built on top of an old landfill and so it is already considered a contaminated site - we won't be contaminating natural ground," Mr Best said.
Planning for this site transformation is well underway and council is working hard towards having the landfill constructed and operational in the near future.
Soon residents in the north of the shire who do not currently have a kerbside service will either have a kerbside service or access to yet to be built bin banks similar to residents in the south.
Until the kerbside expansion has taken place, residents in Quaama and Cobargo and the surrounding areas who do not have a kerbside service will have access to skip bins, located in Cobargo and Quaama, to dispose of household waste.
Only residents that do not have a kerbside service should use these skips.
For Bemboka residents who do not have a kerbside service they can access the Candelo tip, which has extended hours of operation.
The Eden Waste and Recycling Depot will soon resume landfilling to accept the waste from those impacted by fire at the southern end of the shire.
The Eden site was used during the Tathra and district fires in 2018 and council intends to operate it in a similar manner.
The needs of the Eden and surrounding community are being strongly considered and therefore the depot will remain open to the public.
Bin bank users in the southern end of the shire will have their bin banks repaired and bins replaced as a priority.
No fire-affected waste generated from the loss of homes and other structures can be received at either site until the appropriate documentation has been completed and processed by council.
For more information about Council's waste services click here, download the Bega Valley Waste App or phone council on 6499 2222.
