Communities across North America are questioning end-of-pipe solutions like landfills and incinerators and emphasizing community-based waste prevention instead.
The new “Zero Waste” paradigm has become a popular planning approach because it gives local governments tools suited to different waste streams to achieve continuous gains in waste reduction.
Two core strategies underlie the Zero Waste planning approach: Extended Producer Responsibility and organics diversion. A good waste plan for Metro Vancouver would centre on these two initiatives to reduce waste and make municipal incinerators unnecessary.
EPR + organics diversion = Zero Waste, or darned close.
Three-quarters of our wastes are products or packages with brand-names on them. These products are designed for disposal – a practice that is encouraged by taxpayer supported landfills and incinerators.
EPR is an internationally recognized policy approach that shifts responsibility for products and packaging back to the brand-owner. Governments set goals and deadlines for recycling and the brand-owners provide recycling solutions.
EPR is an effective preventative waste-reduction strategy because producers have a built-in incentive to design less wasteful products. They also provide efficient, cost-effective “reverse-distribution” services to get their products back as required under the law.
BC has precedent-setting EPR provincial policies but they must be reinforced with sound municipal policies, as proposed by Zero Waste Vancouver.
As much as 40% of our waste is compostable organics. These include not just yard trimmings but also food scraps and a whole range of non-recyclable, biodegradable wood and paper products.
Organics diversion is a proven and effective way communities can reduce their waste significantly, while also producing a valuable soil amendment that can benefit local gardens and farmland.
Climate change concerns add urgency to the removal of organics from the waste stream. Due to organics, landfills are the second greatest human caused source of methane, a GHG 23 times more potent than the exhaust from our cars.
The provincial government’s Climate Action Plan issued in July 200823 highlights this need. The top strategy specific to the waste sector is “keeping organic waste out of landfills.”
But unfortunately the province’s only action to-date has been to propose an end-of-pipe solution, a regulation that would require the capture of methane after it has formed in landfills. The preventative approach is to ensure that organics do not enter the landfill in the first place: organics diversion.
BC’s Climate Action Plan also calls for organics diversion but it stops short of the strong policy used in Nova Scotia. There the government passed a province-wide ban on landfilling organics. Municipalities responded with Green Bin programs to collect organics separately from waste.
The Halifax region took the preventative approach one step further. They installed a Mechanical Biological Treatment system to screen, shred and compost residual wastes before they enter the landfill. This not only reduces methane-producing “fermentation” of waste underground but reduces other environmental impacts and extends the life of the landfill by reducing waste volumes up to 50%.
Canadian leaders. Nova Scotia banned organics from landfills in 1998. Municipalities responded by introducing separate collection of compostable organics. Within two years, Nova Scotia became the only province in Canada to meet its 50% waste reduction goal. Responding to citizen pressure, Halifax also installed the only MBT pre-treatment system in North America. MBT pre-treatment prevents methane emissions.
We can do better than this.
Producer responsibility holds the key to reducing waste – unless we relax our standards. The European Packaging Directive was amended in 2003 to allow bags of packaging like these to go to an incinerator. This is what happens when we blur the line between recycling and incineration. Gone is any incentive to design reusable, recyclable packaging.
23 Climate Action Plan. (Cited October 7, 2008)