Valorization of non-organic waste on Saint-Honorat Island

Saint-Honorat, is a private island in Cannes’bay owned by the Lérins Abbey. Twenty monks live there permanently and welcome around 100 000 visitors per year, with a peak at around 2000 visitors per day during summer.
The island of Saint-Honorat is in line with the Mission Ocean & Waters because it carries out several activities to clean the island and beaches from plastic reduction.
The use of single-use plastic has been eliminated at the island²s restaurant. We are also trying to reduce the overpackaging of products imported from the mainland, but sanitary constraints and transport logistics make it difficult for the moment.
In 2019, we removed 50 waste bins for visitors, encouraging them to bring their own waste to the site. We have also organized different activities, such as waste collection actions aiming especially the collection of marine litter, with schools and volunteers from our region in order to raise awareness among local population about the sea pollution and the importance of maintaining its marine ecosystem.
Our project is to improve the management of the non-organic waste. Currently, all the non-organic waste of the island is evacuated to the continent, then incinerated. The waste is collected by the Agglomeration Community "Cannes Pays de Lérins", which for the moment is not able to ensure a selective collection of the waste of the island Saint-Honorat, except for the glass. Since 2019, we have already reduced the amount of waste evacuated by removing the waste bins destined for visitors, which has reduced the total tonnage of waste evacuated by about 1/3 in one year (60 tons in 2018 against 43 tons in 2022).
In order to recycle a large part of the non-organic waste of the island of Saint-Honorat, our objective is to set up a selective sorting of plastic and cardboard on the island, to purchase a press that would allow to compact these cardboard and plastic into ballots. These ballots will then be sold to service providers specialized in the recycling of this kind of waste. The number of barges and the decrease in the tonnage of waste evacuated on the continent proves the importance of this project as it has an indirect impact on sea pollution. Currently, we are at about 40 tons of waste evacuated without sorting on a year. We will be able to evaluate the reduction of the carbon footprint (less transport by barge, and less incinerated waste). We will also precisely know the tonnage of waste now recycled, as it is communicated to us by the service of the collection of "Cannes Pays de Lérins".
The CCIC will be responsible for the collection of plastic and cardboard waste, baling, sale and disposal on the mainland. The public service of waste collection of "Cannes Pays de Lérins" will be positively impacted by the decrease of non-organic waste that will remain to evacuate.
In addition, the island of Saint-Honorat does not currently have a wastewater treatment infrastructure that is adapted and consistent with the island's uses. These facilities are mostly obsolete. The island's wastewater is discharged directly into the sea through five outfalls. The current situation of the island of Saint-Honorat in terms of sanitation presents risks of deterioration of marine habitats, particularly due to the discharge into the sea by the outfalls. To address these issues, the Abbey of Lerins wishes to implement a comprehensive wastewater treatment on the island, possibly with a system of planted reed filters.