Agricultural Waste

Agricultural waste should be disposed of safely and without harm to the environment. With the introduction of the Waste (Scotland) Regulations 2005, meant that farms now have a duty of care to dispose of their waste like any other business.

The duty of care requires:

• All waste is stored and disposed of responsibly.
• Waste is only handled or dealt with by individuals or businesses that are authorised to deal with it.
• A record is kept of all waste received or transferred through a system of signed 'Waste transfer notes’.

Agricultural waste can be disposed of using the Council’s kerbside collection service (details and prices can be found in the charging register on pages 26-30) or by taking the waste yourself to our waste transfer stations Chinglebraes or Bossack (details of materials accepted, and prices can be found in the charging register on pages 33-37 available from the 'Related Links' section of this page).

Avoidance or minimalised waste is another option for farms through product design, recycling schemes and ‘take back’ services for veterinary or machinery wastes.

Burning on-farm waste

On 1 January 2019, the burning of most on-farm waste came to an end.

To comply with this, farmers have a number of options available to them:

• Plastic wrap can be taken to Isbister Bros Ltd, which is then shipped south to Solway Recycling. The waste should be clean and delivered in bags purchased from Birsay Farmers. Isbister Bros Ltd have depots in Kirkwall and Quoyloo but contact them before arriving (01856841525). If you are transporting your waste to Isbister Bros Ltd then you need to register as a ‘Transporter of Waste’ through SEPA (free registration). A link to MySEPA is available from the 'Related Sites' section of this page.
• Farmers can take their clean plastic wrap to Chinglebraes Waste Transfer Station, St Ola. Please refer to the Council’s charging register for prices (detailed under ‘Mixed and other wastes’ at Chinglebraes). Due to the nature of the materials they would go to Shetland for Landfill.
• The Council also provide a kerbside bin collection service at cost for the disposal of municipal type waste suitable for energy recovery (however this does not include plastic bale wrap or netting).

For any further advice please contact SEPA on 01856871080. To access Chinglebraes or to take up a kerbside bin collection, please contact the Council on 01856873535 extension 2320.