Zero Waste Blog

The next three years

2008-11-14T15:14:00.000-08:00

Municipal elections only come around every 3 years in British Columbia. What do we do the other 1,095 days?

Zero Waste Vancouver wants to make it easy for you to be informed and involved in waste issues in your community between now and the next election.

We'll tell you who is representing you at City Council and Metro Vancouver. We'll tell you when important decisions are coming up when your politicians need advice from you.

The next three years could bring a lot of exciting changes in our communities -- or it could be the same old same old. The thing that will make the difference between same-old-same-old and exciting change is citizen input.

We'll help you be part of the change.

So first go out and vote. Check the results of our candidate survey. See which candidates cared enough to respond to the poll, find out where they stand, and reward them at the polls.

The responses to our survey keep coming in. Here are some more candidates who said NO to incinerators: Dave Loewen (Abbtfd), Sue Halsey-Brandt (Rmd), Chris Jones (PoCo), Candace Gordon (Maple Rdge), Ernie Daykin (Maple Rdge)....

Pic: E-participa

Special mention for the Work Less Party

2008-11-11T18:57:00.000-08:00

In our survey of the civic election landscape this season, one electoral organization stood way out in front of the others for the depth of its analysis of the waste problems we face and the solutions available to us.

The Work Less Party platform features a detailed plank of waste policies and positions. And it's right on the front page.

Rightly so.

Our waste problem is intimately linked to the whole range of other problems facing our communities, from marginalization of local artists, to depreciation of the natural environment, to neglect of the homeless, to loss of jobs overseas -- all the way to the emptiness of our lives, spent working too hard just to support our "endless consumption."

The Work Less Party position on waste is a tough one. They want our cities to set rules and enforce them. They want to hold producers responsible. At the same time, they want to create economic opportunities in our communities from activities that reduce waste. Their waste solutions are part of their broader program of localization, innovation, building government from the grassroots upwards: community based governance.

Don't let the funny name fool you. Some of their solutions are more practical than others, but the Work Less Party is starting a conversation that many other candidates we surveyed are ready to join. Especially in the turbulent economic period we are entering, new solutions will be the only ones available to us.

Pic: Work Less Party

Voting for Zero Waste

2008-11-11T13:27:00.000-08:00

Interested in knowing where your favourite civic candidates stand on Metro Vancouver's plan to build waste incinerators?

See our news release to learn the names of the 80 candidates across the Metro region who have gone on record as opposing incinerators in anyone's backyard.

The opposition to incineration in our region spans the political spectrum. It reflects a broad commitment to waste reduction rather than band-aid solutions like landfilling and incineration.

Notably, in Vancouver the Vision/COPE/Green slates responded to the survey opposing incineration but neither the NPA nor any individual candidates on that ticket chose to respond to the survey.

Pic: New Zealand history

Recycling retrenchment

2008-11-09T09:05:00.000-08:00

Last April Zero Waste Vancouver posted an urgent comment about "single stream" recycling. This refers to curbside recycling programs that collect all materials -- paper, bottles, cans, plastic -- in a single container.

We cautioned that single-stream recycling is a bad idea because the materials lose value when they are all mixed up together. The perceived benefits (simpler for the public, larger quantities of material collected) are more than offset by the disadvantages.

The current economic downturn is putting communities that collect recyclables in a single stream at even greater risk.

Recyclers across North America are reporting that recycling markets are tanking. Because of reduced consumer demand, there is also reduced producer demand for recycled materials. This means recycling markets are becoming very picky about quality.

A consultant who works with recycling brokers just stated on a recycling listserv that "quality is a huge issue right now and commingled
recyclables do not hold as high a value than single stream collected."

Another consultant who works with the paper industry confirmed: "domestic paper mills are now able to drive down the prices they pay for fiber and they can now choose among sources for the highest quality. This means that single stream processors with commingled bales of fiber are in the weakest position and they're the ones scrambling for storage facilities because they're having trouble selling their materials. Clean, sorted fibers have the widest market options. Only a limited subset of mills can use commingled fibers, so the more processors that produce that, the more limited their options."
commodities.

Even before the economic downturn, a 2002 study by Eureka Recycling in the US found: "Single-stream collection — where all recyclables are put in one container — proved to be more expensive because a lot of sorting is required before the materials go to market. It also resulted in higher contamination and more materials being thrown out."

Citizens need to inform themselves about the reality of recycling markets and educate the public and their elected representatives about the importance of keeping materials clean and separate.

Pic: Eureka Recycling

Rainy weekend fun

2008-11-07T12:11:00.000-08:00

Get out of the rain this weekend at the second annual Re:Vision Art of Recycling show. Plan to spend plenty of time browsing this tiny show full of works of art that have been created out of scrounged items ~ things useful, beautiful, odd, playful, or thought provoking.

See how fun it will be when we have no-where to go but our landfills and attics for raw materials...

Saturday features music by SWARM. Sunday will have a workshop with Ruby Dog's Art House making "altered books."

Don't miss it. It's at the Granville Island Hotel, 11 - 5 Sat & Sun.

Economic collapse extends landfill life

2008-11-06T20:12:00.000-08:00

Metro doomsayers can breathe easier. We may not have to ship garbage to the US after all. Economic collapse may save the day.

Last week I sent out a query to Zero Waste associates asking if anyone is seeing declines in waste volumes.

Seattle waste manager Jenny Bagby reported declines in their waste that began in December 07. Waste volumes down overall 8.3% from a year ago.

A consultant based in Phoenix said his clients are reporting dips of 10% to 40%, depending on the company's core business or the waste stream they deal with.

Jerry Powell, who publishes Resource Recycling magazine, said the bigger declines are in construction waste, but they will be seen in commercial and residential waste too.

Last week at a waste conference in Courtenay, Jerry told all the delegates something they already knew: not only is waste down, but the markets for recycled materials are "in the tank." The other end of the slowdown. Wayne Turner in North Carolina mused that landfill disposal may be "our new crystal ball."

Interestingly, while waste and recycling are down, compost volumes are not. Dan Knapp in the California Bay area noted that plants keep growing even when manufacturing is down: "Compost facilities may turn out to be more or less 'recession-proof'."

Knapp: "This could be a good argument for having compost facilities in every community instead of concentrated on agricultural lands. The tip fees and product sales from compost disposal can then act as a stabilizing force within the local economy.?

Is there a lesson here for Metro Vancouver?

Pic: Grow Cook Eat

No one's backyard!

2008-11-06T15:54:00.000-08:00

The early results of our candidate poll are pretty interesting. They suggest that Metro will have trouble finding backyards for their six incinerators.

We sent out 278 surveys on Monday (to all the candidates that had posted email addresses). By noon today we had 81 responses and 77 completed surveys.

We asked 3 simple questions: do you think waste is an important issue, would you support a waste incinerator being built in your community, and do you support Metro's plan to build waste incinerators in the region?

There were 4 respondents who told us they would accept an incinerator in their own community (two in Langley City and one on the North Shore).

The Hypocrite Award goes to the six respondents who said not in my community -- but it's fine if they build it somewhere else in the region.

The survey found overwhelming opposition to Metro's plan to build waste incinerators: 58 of the 77 respondents said they disapproved. Another 10 respondents are still thinking about it...

And the opposition crossed all political lines. More details later...

COOL 2012 ~ sign us up!

2008-11-06T13:12:00.000-08:00

"As communities work to decrease greenhouse gas emissions, the first place to look is in the garbage can..." This is the basis of the COOL 2012 campaign ~ Compostable Organics Out of Landfills by 2012.

The campaign is being organized by a formidable team (Grassroots Recycling Network, BioCycle magazine and EcoCycle). They say that organics composting is "the quickest and cheapest way to immediately reduce your community’s greenhouse gas emissions."

Visit their website for details.

Back to basics

2008-11-06T12:22:00.000-08:00

Here's a picture that came today from international campaigner Bev Thorpe, who is preparing a report for the Prime Minister of Bhutan on what to do with his country's waste.

This is their only landfill and it's almost full.

The rest of the country, Bev says, is "all mountains and valleys with no flat land ... up and down Himalayan geography."

Bev reports that they are getting a composting plant up and running and that up to 80% of their waste is compostible organics (food and paper).

As this picture illustrates, "the wonderful thing about Bhutan is that they have NO hazardous waste and they have a VERY LOW consuming society."

I suggested that she advise the Prime Minister to buy a baler and bury what's left (mostly flimsy plastic packaging) in tight bales that don't take up much space. Come to think of it, that's a pretty good plan for Metro Vancouver too!

Chilliwack rallies for clean air

2008-11-05T17:26:00.000-08:00

On Monday afternoon, the good folk of Chilliwack will gather at their new Courthouse Square, a venue that was opened two years by their representative in the BC Parliament, Environment Minister Barry Penner.

They will be meeting there to rally against Metro's proposed garbage incinerators.

"All 3 of Chilliwack's Mayoral hopefuls will attend (with equal speaking time)," said organizer Norm Smith, "in a non-partisan show of unity against Vancouver's incinerators."

Organizers of the rally say that "Every candidate in Chilliwack is opposed to the incinerator plan and all seem well educated regarding the environmental and health risks involved."

"This will be a day for all Fraser Valley residents to put aside their differences and stand together for an essential goal that we all share."

The rally gets going at 3:30 and ends at 5:00. If you go, dress warmly!

For details send an email to
savechilliwack@inbox.com

pic: Opening Day at the new Courthouse Square, May 2002

Zero Waste Call to Action!

2008-11-03T14:40:00.001-08:00

It's election time in Metro Vancouver. Where do your candidates for Mayor and Council stand on waste incineration?

Zero Waste Vancouver has issued a Call to Action outlining 7 reasons we think Metro's plan to build waste incinerators would be a terrible mistake for our region.

Read our Call to Action and then ask your favourite candidates where they stand on Metro's plan. If they are elected, they will be called on to take a stand. Ask them which way their vote will go -- for $3 billion dollar garbage incinerators or for real waste reduction?

It's time for change we can believe in....

Recycling Council opposes Waste-to-Energy

2008-10-26T09:37:00.000-07:00

The Recycling Council of BC (RCBC), a respected voice in waste management in this province for almost 40 years, has issued an important paper about "Waste-to-Energy."

The paper examines the claims of Plasco Energy Group in its proposal for a 400 tonne-per-day facility in Port Moody.

Its findings affirm the concerns that caused Port Moody council to reject Plasco's proposal earlier this month.

But the paper emphasizes that the report is "neither a statement against or in favour of Plasco Energy Group's proposal."

It is rather an indictment of Waste-to-Energy as a waste management option.

The introduction states that that "RCBC recently reaffirmed its position against using WTE as part of the waste-management regime in B.C.

"It is RCBC's position that the use of WTE does nothing to encourage waste reduction, and that WTE would in fact be quite unnecessary if full extended producer responsibility programs (product stewardship) and full organics diversion were in place."

The conclusion states: "With the funds required for Metro Vancouver to build and operate new WTE facilities, a host of ground-breaking Zero Waste initiatives could instead be introduced. These initiatives would ensure that the region's annual disposal rate does not exceed one million tonnes and would have the eventual goal of negating the need to landfill at all."

This paper is a major contribution to a growing number of papers being produced in the public interest that support a Zero Waste planning approach, rather than traditional waste disposal-focused waste solutions.

Pic: RCBC Background Paper

Alberta to put refundable deposits on milk containers

2008-10-23T07:10:00.000-07:00

Which future do we want for our region?

Do we want to build a million tonnes of incineration capacity to vaporize garbage into the atmosphere?

Or do we want to hand the garbage problem to the people who caused it: the producers of throw-away products and packaging?

When the beverage industry switched from refillable bottles to throw-away containers, this dumped a big problem on local communities who were faced with disposing of literally billions of containers that used to go back to stores.

But British Columbia and then Alberta took a strong stand.

They became the first jurisdictions in North America to require beverage companies to take back their empties and issue a cash reward for recycling.

Overnight beverage containers stopped being a garbage problem. Instead they became a fund-raising project for kids' hockey teams and scout groups.

Today 3 out of 4 empty containers find their way back to the producers for recycling in BC and Alberta and the 6 other Canadian provinces that require refundable deposits -- compared to 1 container out of 5 in places like Ontario where there is no producer-responsibility program.

But yesterday Alberta decided even that wasn't good enough.

The Alberta government announced that they are raising the cash recycling reward that producers must pay from 5 cents to 10 cents.

They're also requiring producers to get back 85% of the containers they sell.

And that's not all.

They told milk producers that they had to do the same thing as other beverage companies. Starting next June, consumers will get a cash reward for recycling milk containers, just as they do for all other beverage containers.

This is the future.

No longer will producers of throw-away products and packaging be allowed to dump their waste problem on local communities. Like Alberta, BC is a world leader in producer-responsibility legislation.

When all of the throw-away products and packaging in Metro Vancouver goes back to producers the way beverage containers (and computers and TVS and a whole range of household hazardous products do), our garbage will shrink by 570,000 tonnes each year.

All that will be left is compostable organics.

If we build all those incinerators, what will we put in them?

Pic: Food Poison Blog

City of the Arts says no to garbage gasification

2008-10-19T20:57:00.000-07:00

"Upon deliberation of the Task Force recommendations, Council passed these resolutions: THAT the City of Port Moody is not an appropriate location for a waste conversion facility..."

With these words, Port Moody Council made it official last Tuesday night, becoming the first municipality in the region to say NO to hosting a "waste-to-energy" facility for Metro's garbage.

Moreover, Port Moody Council instructed staff to forward six concerns to the Metro Vancouver Board, among them:

THAT any regional waste to energy initiative should be fully evaluated, in both a local and regional context, and should be temporary in nature as we take positive measures to increase diversion and thus reduce the residual waste to a level where it could be handled by existing methods, thus eliminating the need to consider any waste to energy solution...

Pic: Port Moody banner painting festival

Penner supports garbage burning

2008-10-16T10:06:00.000-07:00

Does the provincial government support garbage burning?

Environment Minister Barry Penner just sent me a turgidly worded but unequivocal response to my email of last April, in which I asked if the government's Bill 29 made garbage burning the equivalent of recycling.

His answer: yes.

Here is what the minister said: The introduction of “recovery” in Bill 29 will allow discussions to occur to determine whether alternatives to landfilling of non-recyclables in BC should proceed and, if so, in what form.

De-constructed, Penner's sentence means: the province is doing what the European Parliament did in 2003 when it redefined garbage burning as recycling.

In 1994 Europe became a world leader for requiring producers to "recover" (recycle) their packaging waste. But a News Report issued by the EU in December 2003 announced a new policy:

"Should incineration of packaging waste count as 'recovery'? Recent judgments by the European Court of Justice stated that incineration of municipal waste in incinerators is to be regarded as a disposal operation if the main purpose of the operation is to dispose of the waste.

"As a result of these judgments, packaging waste incinerated in such installations could no longer be counted towards the recovery targets of the Packaging Directive.

"Consequently, in order to reach an agreement the EP and Council clarified the word "recovery" in the light of the Court's judgment.

Whereas the 1994 Directive calls for packaging waste to be "recovered", the revised law will now read "to be recovered or incinerated at waste incineration plants with energy recovery", thereby broadening the definition of what is understood by 'recovery' in this context."

At the stroke of a legislative pen, political leaders in Europe and BC are blurring an important distinction between recycling and burning -- a distinction that has guided waste policy for nearly two decades.

By opening the door to "recovery" of energy, our provincial parliament and the European Parliament are letting producers off the hook, encouraging the production of throw-away products and packaging that cannot be recycled.

Do you think this is a step in the wrong direction? Tell Barry Penner:

env.minister@gov.bc.ca

Pic: Tell Penner that anaerobic digestion makes more sense than incineration

Fin Donnelly pushes on last 30%

2008-10-15T22:27:00.000-07:00

Coquitlam Councillor Fin Donnelly pushed staff at the regional Waste Management Committee meeting yesterday to tell the public what their plan is to get beyond 70% recycling -- to 80%? 90%?

He seemed to be probing the problem of whether incinerators will create an obstacle to further recycling.

The staff gave its stock response: the last 30% is "material that has no recycling value." But Donnelly quickly interjected "at this point in time."

Donnelly can always be counted on at Committee meetings to ask probing questions that show he's carefully read every page of the 3-inch-thick agenda packages the committee members receive each month.

During the entire discussion at yesterday's meeting, this graph from Zero Waste Vancouver was up on the screen in the Metro Boardroom. It shows what our waste will look like after we have succeeded in achieving the 70% recycling goal.

The tall black bar that looks like an incinerator stack represents over half-a-million tonnes of throw-away products and packaging that will become dirty "fuel" in Metro's plan. The smaller black bars, including one representing 60% of the compostable organics in our waste in 2035, will also be burned.

Do you think we can do better? Tell Fin Donnelly:

<fdonnelly@coquitlam.ca>

How much is Marvin Hunt prepared to spend on incinerators?

2008-10-15T21:00:00.000-07:00

Today Zero Waste Vancouver is beginning a campaign to make waste management an issue in the civic elections.

As a courtesy, we went along to the monthly meeting of the regional Waste Managment Committee to give them a heads-up. They, after all, are the ones on whose watch Metro has made its "commitment" to garbage incineration.

The committee heard an earful today -- and not just from Zero Waste Vancouver.

Lara Tessaro speaking for Ecojustice and the Georgia Strait Alliance, called Metro's draft Liquid Waste Management Plan "fundamentally inappropriate" for backsliding on commitments to get moving on long overdue upgrades to the North Shore sewage treatment plants. In response, the committee spent a lot of time formulating a motion blaming the senior levels of government for not providing funds.

Then Elaine Golds and Jo-Anne Parneta (a self-described "angry voter" and former Port Moody City Councillor) gave a vivid demonstration of how the citizens of Port Moody chased Plasco out of town.

(Their Mayor Joe Trasolini, who had been an outspoken proponent of Plasco, sat silently at the Committee table while they talked.)

Marvin Hunt, Surrey Councillor and chair of the committee, kept interrupting to assure the citizen delegations that we will have plenty of opportunity "next year" to help decide what kind of technology we will use to burn our garbage.

Then, when Parneta mentioned the bylaw decision last April authorizing a quarter-billion dollars in borrowing for waste-to-energy facilities, Hunt gave a long-winded response that ended up: "after all, a quarter-billion won't go very far."

Huh?

These politicians won't shell out to provide minimal sewage treatment -- but money seems to be no object when it comes to burning garbage.

How much is Marvin Hunt prepared to spend on incinerators?

Ask him: "Marvin Hunt" <jmhunt@city.surrey.bc.ca>

Pic: CBC: "Waste-to-energy plans raise concerns..."

What Metro's incinerators will cost us

2008-10-11T08:33:00.000-07:00

One of the things that Metro Vancouver is not talking to us about is the cost of incinerating waste.

This graph is from Metro's Strategy for Updating the Solid Waste Management Plan, page 10.

The Scenarios for Metro Vancouver are to spend $2.5 billion on a "centralized" system with 3 incinerators, or $3 billion on a "distributed" system (6 facilities required).

The Metro Board has already authorized the first quarter of a billion dollars on "Waste-to-Energy" facilities.

Is this where we want our money spent?

Do we want to spend billions of public dollars to build and maintain machines that will destroy materials that will someday have greater value for recycling?

Plasco dragon slain ~ but more on the way

2008-10-10T09:27:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to the citizens of Port Moody ~ democracy is alive and well.

Through the dog-days of summer, hundreds of citizens showed up night after night and made an irrefutable case against Plasco Energy Group's dioxin factory.

Listening to arguments from citizen heroes like JoAnne Parneta, Elaine Golds and dozens of other well-informed speakers, the City's task force had no choice but to recommend that Council not pursue the foolish plan to let Plasco gasify hundreds of thousands of tonnes of garbage in their city.

But the work has just begun.

"Waste-to-energy" is still is still lurking like a cancer at the heart of Metro Vancouver's mendacious "Zero Waste Challenge."

Need evidence?

Next week Metro's Waste Management Committee will consider a budget that allocates over $33 million dollars in 2009 on direct expenditures for incineration. (For comparison, the amount they are allocating for "solid waste demand reduction" -- measures to work with the community to make less waste in the first place: $939,159.)

The incineration expenditures will include not only building new incinerators, but ongoing costly upgrades to the existing facility in Burnaby.

One of the "Operational Priorities" in the budget is inspection and overhaul of WtEF turbo-generator." The turbine was installed only 5 years ago at a cost of $36 million and it already needs an "overhaul"??

Build incinerators and you just keep spending good money after bad.

Zero Waste Vancouver has been silent for a while because we are gearing up for a campaign to make these incinerators an election issue in the civic election campaign. Not a single elected official has made a peep against the plan to spend $3 billion on garbage burners. Most of them, I am betting, don't even know it's in the works.

Watch for our launch at the Metro Waste Management Committee meeting next week, where we'll be joining JoAnne and Elaine and their delegation from Port Moody. We will be issuing a 4-page backgrounder that lays out an alternative plan of action for Metro and our communities. And while you're waiting for the campaign to start, sign our petition to Choose Zero Waste over Incinerators.

Pic: Deliberative Democracy Handbook

Another inspiring recycling movie

2008-10-08T09:54:00.000-07:00

My friend Guy Crittenden, editor of Canada's premier recycling trade magazine Solid Waste & Recycling, wrote to say that he's steering his readers in next month's October/November edition to a movie that celebrates a great Zero Waste icon.

Garbage Warrior (winner of the Audience Award at last year's VIFF) profiles "biotect" Michael Reynolds. Reynolds builds sturdy, earthquake and recession-proof homes out of pop bottles and tires. The structures are beautiful to Crittenden's eye, achieving what he called a kind of “Salvador Dali meets the Flintstones” effect.

As we hunker down for the Great Depression ahead, emissaries from the Back to the Land movement in the early 70s will have valuable lessons for us.

Garbage Warrior is available at Limelight Video at Broadway and Alma. Anyone want to come over and watch it at my house?

Pic: Earthship News

More handwriting on the wall

2008-10-06T15:02:00.000-07:00

This week Canadian Springs made big headlines in Ontario by announcing that they will charge refundable deposits on bottles they deliver to customers. The new program is rolling out in Ontario, BC and the Maritime provinces.

It won't make much of a splash here or in the Maritimes. We already have refundable deposits on water bottles.

But Canadian Springs is really rocking the boat in Ontario. The beverage industry there has been fighting refundable deposits for twenty years. Ontario is still the only province in Canada besides Manitoba where consumers don't get a cash reward for recycling.

The defection of Canadian Springs is one more sign that the tide is going out for the shaky enterprise of collecting bottles and cans in the Blue Box.

Why send diesel trucks door to door to collect bubbles of air, when you can support a local hockey team with a bottle drive instead?

Pic: Eco-friendly graffiti in Greece

How to make progress

2008-10-04T15:45:00.000-07:00

I missed the Metro Board meeting yesterday, but the coverage this morning in the Vancouver Sun suggests it was a real prattfall by the Directors.

The Sun reports that the Metro Board voted to "work with local business associations, retailers and consumers to discourage the use of plastic shopping bags" but then in the same breath disparaged that industry's offer to take responsibility for the problem.

Some working relationship!

I am no Pollyanna when it comes to voluntary industry promises, but I see in this proposal something that we can work with. A broad group of retail associations have made a commitment to cut plastic bag use in half in five years. Measurable goal, clear timeline.

Meanwhile, Councillor Hunt is counting his chickens of 60% and 70% and 75% reduction before he has hatched any program at all.

The fact is that the only people who can fix the plastic bag problem is the folks who hand out plastic bags. With proper oversight by government and the public.

Zero Waste Vancouver has sent a letter to the ministry of environment asking:

has the retail industry has reported a baseline (the number of bags used now) for us to measure their progress against?

will the industry be reporting to the ministry on their progress?

When industry comes to the table, play -- but make sure there is a referee. I just hope that the grocers won't take their marbles and go home, leaving their bags to "clog up our landfills" (though I'd rather have them stored safely underground than vaporized into the atmosphere in one of Marvin Hunt's planned incinerators).

Zero Waste Vancouver will watchdog this program and hold the industry's feet to the fire if they fall short, just as our friends in Australia are doing. pic: Zero Waste South Australia

Culture shift: plastic bags a retailer responsibility

2008-09-24T11:24:00.000-07:00

Today's surprise announcement by Canada's retail industry that they are rolling out a "comprehensive plan" to cut plastic bag use in BC shows that British Columbia is still the Canadian testing ground for the culture shift that is going to take us, eventually, to Zero Waste.

Canada's four major grocery and drug store retail associations have committed to cut the use of carry-out bags in this province by 50% within the next five years.

Skeptics will scoff that this is a voluntary initiative with no teeth, but I think there is a lot to learn from this move by the industry.

The grocers did not do what they would have done in Ontario ~ chip in a few crumbs of funding and expect the municipal governments to haul away the bags for recycling.

Rather, their plan is to shift the management of bags from local governments to the stores that give them out.

Their plan proposes more than just token recycling bins. They are using the tools of the retail trade ~ incentives, recycling services, and alternatives ~ to woo consumers into helping them meet the goal.

Most important, it includes a commitment to monitor bag use and report out their progress. This is where most voluntary producer programs fail the grade. No one knows what a bad job the Rechargeable Battery Recycling Corporation's "Charge up to Recycle" program is doing because noone is measuring or reporting out. (All they tell you is how many millions of batteries they've collected, not how many tens of millions they have let go to landfills - no targets, no accoutability.)

My sense is that we are about to become "Greenbag Nation" like Australia.

(And I anticipate that, like the wonderful Boomerang Alliance down under, we Zero Wasters can be counted on to hold the retailers' toes to the fire if they don't meet their goal ~ and then move up to a more challenging one.)

Pic: Greenbag nation

Speak out ~ landfill gas regulation not good enough

2008-09-16T14:24:00.000-07:00

Here's a good place to start our campaign to stop methane pollution: tell the province that end-of-pipe solutions are not good enough.

The provincial government is seeking input on a proposed Landfill Gas regulation that would require local governments to install gas capture systems. Problem is: these systems miss most of the gas produced by rotting garbage. More than half the gas slips by the pipes and up to the atmosphere.

A much better approach, chosen by the provincial government of Nova Scotia, is the preventative approach. They simply banned organic wastes from being disposed in landfills. They did this back in 1999. Within months the province's waste had been cut by nearly half (to say nothing of the decline in methane).

In Nova Scotia everyone puts their food waste in Green Bins. Even Tim Horton's provides a special container for half-eaten donuts and coffee cups.

Why stop with half-way measures? Tell our province to follow Nova Scotia's example and use a carrot-and-stick approach to help local communities prevent the methane problem.

Go here for the feedback form (due by September 30). Go here for background info.

Take back the agenda

2008-09-16T13:02:00.000-07:00

I'm just back from a conference in Australia. Where the water goes down the drain clockwise, right? Where, more to the point, every toilet is dual-flush. Drought is a subject that everyone has an opinion on, and the opinion is: something is terribly wrong and we have to do something about it.

One thing they're doing is to tackle the methane problem from landfills, one of the drivers of climate change. It's something we don't talk about enough.

Here in Canada, even in Toronto, we're serious about the producer's responsibility to recycle all those throw-away products and packaging. And that's a good thing. Extending the producer's responsibility will give the atmosphere a break by turning the tide on excess consumption.

But if all the throwaway products and packaging were banned from the planet, we would still have a big waste problem.

According to a new waste study from Metro Vancouver each of us sends 163 kilograms of sloppy wet organic wastes to the landfill each year. And that is an understatement, because it doesn't include greasy pizza boxes and a whole range of other organic wastes too awful to mention.

And what do these "biodegradable" wastes do in the landfill? They produce vast quantities of methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than the exhaust from our cars.

I came home from Australia determined to mount a mobilization to get every scrap of organics out of our municipal waste. It is something we don't have to wait for the producers to do ~ we are the producers. The problem exists because we let it happen, on our watch, with our municipal infrastructure.

Instead of hiding our food waste problem in a hole in the ground, we can follow the Australians' example. We can close the food production link, sending food waste back to nourish the land it came from. We live in a food-growing region with a lot of animal husbandry, imposing its own burden on the land and the atmosphere. How about if we work with the Fraser Valley to solve our mutual organic waste problems instead of threatening them with incinerator emissions?

Pic: BC Sustainable Poultry Farming Group