Gwaiing landfill site: 4 years to closure

GEORGE NEWS - Between 5 000 and 6 000 tonnes of household waste on the Gwaiing waste site in George and on the Uniondale site are transported to the PetroSA waste site each month, according to Sivuyile Mtila, George Municipality’s acting director of Community Services,

Georgians regularly using the Gwaiing site have again aired their concerns about the mountain of waste that seems to be growing taller.

However, the site is almost four years from being closed. The initial 2022 deadline for the decommissioning and closure has been extended to 29 November 2029.

In the meantime, the municipality is busy with the identification of a site for building rubble, which has increased because of the upsurge in the town’s development activity.

“Currently, the municipality has gone out on a tender for the crushing of building rubble for beneficiation purposes [converting the rubble into aggregate materials like gravel for use in new concrete, asphalt or sub-base layers]. In terms of the current plans, building rubble will be crushed and garden refuse will be diverted to the composting facility. Bulky waste will be compacted and disposed of at the regional landfill site.”

Giving an update on the municipality’s Section 24G application, Mtila said a pre-application had been finalised in June last year.

“Currently, the studies are being reviewed by the specialist before the submission to the DEADP [Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning]. We anticipate submitting the application before 31 March.”

The Section 24G application is for dumping outside of the legal footprint of the landfill, dumping within 32m of a watercourse (the Gwaiing River), and the correction of the site’s co-ordinates.

One of the mountains of waste at the Gwaiing landfill site.