Muswellbrook Shire Council will position itself as a regional solution to the Hunter’s growing waste problem but the mayor of Maitland, Cr Peter Blackmore, said it wasn’t so simple.

“What has to be taken into account is transport,” he said.

Maitland is in the planning stages of a waste transfer station at its East Maitland facility that will allow greater sorting of recycling and enable compression of waste.

“The idea is to have the waste compressed then transferred,” Cr Blackmore said.

“It’s too expensive to expect our garbage trucks to run up there, unload, and come back.”

Maitland’s landfill site is at capacity but the waste transfer station is expected to slow the amount of waste going into the ground.

“It’s one way of managing our own waste,” Cr Blackmore said.

Fairfax reported that Muswellbrook had applied to the NSW Department of Planning to convert the old mine void for a waste dump partly on the basis that the Hunter would produce 350,000 tonnes of waste annually by 2021.

“That’s fine but the people living around it might not be that happy about it,” Cr Blackmore said.

“These things would have to be taken into account.”