Passionate about sustainable business? Find out how WastePlan has empowered the world-renowned V&A Waterfront to exceed their target of diverting 50% waste (more than 300 tonnes per month!) from landfill.

About the client

The V&A Waterfront is located in the oldest working harbour in the southern hemisphere, with the majestic Table Mountain as its backdrop. The 123-hectare neighbourhood is, in essence, a mini-city: with 800+ tenants, 2,000+ residents, 13 hotels, and about 24 million visitors every year. On top of that, about 28,000 people work there every day.

Once you realise the magnitude of what ‘the V&A Waterfront’ encompasses, it is no surprise to learn that they have multiple challenges with regards to waste management and recycling. The biggest of which is the unrelenting high waste volumes – that needs to be collected, transported and processed without affecting the first-class experience of the millions of tourists and visitors.

The challenges

The V&A Waterfront generates high volumes of waste, day in, day out. There is never a ‘quiet time’ that provides a moment to catch up. They collect and handle 560–600 tonnes of waste per month, and in the festive season this easily increases to 800 tonnes. 

The many hotels, restaurants and various markets generate incredibly high volumes of organic waste. Since the Western Cape government has banned organic waste to landfill by 2027, this means that finding alternative solutions of recovering organic waste is a top priority.

All the different waste streams, and the high volumes of waste, needed to be processed in a compact  on-site Waste Recovery and Recycling Centre. 

Importantly, the V&A Waterfront have very little operational control over the sources of waste. The tenants are the waste generators, yet as landlord the V&A Waterfront has full responsibility to dispose of the waste responsibly and cost-effectively.

Their waste diversion target could only be achieved through detailed tracking and reporting that not only satisfied legal requirements, but also supported their overall sustainability strategy. They needed a waste management partner with a proven, robust data system.

The WastePlan solution

So, starting on-site in October 2022, how did WastePlan empower the V&A Waterfront to exceed their waste diversion target?

First, an authentic value alignment between the V&A Waterfront and WastePlan, as well as a mutual commitment to innovation, laid the foundation for an effective working relationship.

Then WastePlan conducted detailed audits of every waste stream, generated by every tenant. This meant that the procurement and/or operational processes of particular tenants could be adapted to suit their needs – while minimising both waste generation and contamination.

Accurate tracking of every waste stream collected from each tenant was implemented. This meant that every kilogram of waste generated by each tenant could be monitored and managed independently, and supported the V&A Waterfront management team to implement incentives aimed at tenants taking ownership of their waste.

Tenants received intensive training about the implementation of separation-at-source to limit the contamination of recycling. 

WastePlan established a strategic route to collect waste effectively, with minimal impact on the V&A Waterfront operations. This 4km route now runs 24/7 with 400 collection points and 4 dedicated vehicles.

Besides completely reorganising the on-site Waste Recovery and Recycling Centre and applying new sorting techniques, WastePlan also brought in site-specific equipment to enable efficiency.

The results

WastePlan started on-site in October 2022, confident that they could enable the V&A Waterfront to achieve their target of diverting 50% waste from landfill (up from the 35% achieved by their previous service provider) – which they managed to achieve within the 2nd month. 

A year later, the waste diversion rate is at an impressive 70% (in other words, preventing ±408 tonnes per month from going to landfill).

What the client had to say

“For the V&A Waterfront, it was vitally important for us to choose the right business partner when it comes to waste management. Since we’ve joined forces with WastePlan, we’ve seen phenomenal growth in our diversion ratios,” said Petro Myburgh, Senior Manager (Sustainability). 

“We have been thoroughly impressed with the way WastePlan implemented new on-site sorting techniques and made operational changes. For every waste stream, WastePlan would consider all possible avenues to make sure that they divert waste from landfill, but in a way that it is still economically feasible. They do it with so much pride and dedication that I commend them for what they do.”