Litter and pollution

Bait packaging discarded at Clifton Gardens. Copyright Eco Divers 2008.

Rubbish and recycling bins are provided – please use them!

Information on what can be recycled can be found on this website.

Help keep Mosman beautiful and healthy.

Litter is unattractive, a safety risk, attracts pests, harms wildlife and is a financial cost for Council to clean up.

Cigarette butts

Cigarette butts are a major problem for our health and environment. Over seven billion cigarette butts are discarded across the nation each year. Most littered butts in Mosman enter our storm water systems and are flushed into the Harbour.

Toxic chemicals including cadmium, lead, arsenic, formaldehyde, mercury, benzene and hydrogen cyanide leach into the water which reduces our water quality and harms our precious marine life.

Mosman Council is one of many Councils Australia-wide serious about enforcing laws against littering and issuing penalties to offenders.

Smokers be warned – drop that butt and risk a fine of up to $200. Carry a small container such as an old film canister, or bag, to store your butts until you can dispose of them properly.

Plastic Bags

Plastic bags can become persistant litter in the environment and a hazard to wildlife that may be entangled in bags or mistake bags as food (turtles mistaking bags as jelly fish). It is estimated that every year between 50 and 80 million bags enter the Australian environment as litter.

What can you do about it?

Local residents – Refuse, Reduce, Reuse & Recycle.

  • Say NO to plastic bags when shopping.
  • Take reusable alternatives like calico, go-green polypropylene or string bags.
  • Encourage others to do the same.
  • Recycle your plastic bags at local supermarkets such Franklins (Bridge Point), Woolworths or Coles. Be careful to check which plastic bags are accepted at the recycling bins – they usually only accept the supermarket style shopping bag (HDPE), not the heavier bags used by other retailers (LDPE).
  • For more information visit cleanup.com.au or planetark.com.au

Local businesses

To find out how you or your business can get involved visit cleanup.com.au or planetark.com.au. A retailer’s kit has been produced by Clean Up Australia to help retailers to start reducing plastic bag use and increase recycling.

Stormwater Management

Mosman Council is reducing the stormwater pollutants and litter flowing into Sydney Harbour through Community Environmental Contract stormwater projects. For information on how to help improve the water quality of Sydney Harbour by preventing stormwater pollution see Stormwater on this website.

Beach Cleaning

Both mechanical and manual beach cleaning are carried out in Mosman. As wrack (seaweed) is vital to maintaining beach ecology some beaches are cleaned manually to minimise disturbance to wrack. Chinaman’s Beach has been cleaned manually since 2004.

The ecology of Chinamans Beach has benefited from being left in its natural state following the commencement of manual beach cleaning, and beach users are not unduly impacted upon by the presence of wrack on the beach.

A Photo-Point Monitoring Program was undertaken at Chinamans Beach during spring/summer 2004 and autumn/winter 2005, to gain an understanding of wrack on Chinamans Beach.

Wrack was been identified as influencing the distribution, abundance and diversity of organisms by providing habitat, shelter and a source of food. Over the course of the monitoring program Chinamans Beach was transformed from a historically ‘bare beach’ into a beach teeming with an abundance and diversity of shells, sponges, shark eggs and other marine organisms, insects, crabs and birdlife.

Spills and pollution

By reporting spills and pollution quickly, the appropriate response can be undertaken rapidly and minimize the harm from the incident. Be a responsible citizen and report any pollution incidents, or anything unusual you observe to Mosman Council’s Rangers or Environment Officers.