In Mykolaiv, lawmakers argued over the risks of a new waste sorting tender

In Mykolaiv, city council members did not support a draft resolution to hold a competitive bidding process for household waste sorting services. Fedir Panchenko warned of potential costs running into the millions for the city, while the Department of Housing and Communal Services insists that waste sorting is necessary to keep the city landfill operational.

The Center for Public Investigations found out what the city council members focused on during their review of the draft resolution on the waste sorting tender.

During the discussion, Mykolaiv City Council member Panchenko drew attention to the terms of the future contract. In particular, he noted that the document does not specify the final cost of waste sorting. Under the proposed model, the municipal enterprise “Mykolaivkomtrans” is to deliver waste to a private company and pay for its services, while the rate will be determined once a specific waste sorter is selected.

He cited the example of Zhytomyr, where, according to him, sorting costs about 988 hryvnias per metric ton. If a similar rate were applied to Mykolaiv, which produces about 140,000 metric tons of household waste per year, the costs could exceed 138 million hryvnias. If the rate were raised to 1,700 hryvnias per metric ton, the total would exceed 200 million hryvnias per year.

The council member also spoke about the risk of a cash shortfall due to non-payment by residents. According to his estimate, the difference between the funds the municipal utility will receive from residents and the payments to the private sorting facility could amount to 30–40 million hryvnias per year.

Some concerns centered on paying the private company a share of the profits from the sale of recyclable materials. Panchenko considers this model insufficiently transparent for community oversight. He also pointed out the lack of a clear requirement regarding the location of the sorting line and, in his opinion, the lack of sufficiently specific conditions regarding the depth of sorting.

Panchenko proposed changing the tender model so that the municipal enterprise would pay for the delivery of waste to the sorting facility, while the private investor’s economic interest would lie in maximizing the recovery of recyclable materials and reducing the volume of waste sent to landfills.

Ihor Nabatov, a representative of the Department of Housing and Communal Services, did not agree with some of the comments. He noted that the final tariff cannot be determined until a specific company is selected, as it will depend on costs for equipment, energy, employee salaries, materials, and the actual volume of waste.

According to Nabatov, the tender documentation was approved by the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine. He also stated that the city has experience monitoring the financial performance of its cooperation with a private investor through its work with the municipal enterprise “Mykolaivkomtrans.”

Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych emphasized that the main problem is the limited capacity of the existing landfill. He said the city had approached the regional military administration regarding a land plot for a new landfill but received a negative response. Therefore, in his opinion, waste sorting should reduce the volume of waste and extend the operational life of the existing landfill.

The draft resolution was put to a vote.

In July, the competitive bidding process to select a company to sort household waste in the city ended without a winner. The sole bidder failed to meet the minimum score requirement, so city authorities announced a new bidding process shortly thereafter.

Анна Літман