Yellowknife to spend $469K on recycling this year though plastic, glass still going to landfill - Action News
Home WebMail Wednesday, November 13, 2024, 03:29 AM | Calgary | -1.0°C | Regions Advertise Login | Our platform is in maintenance mode. Some URLs may not be available. |
North

Yellowknife to spend $469K on recycling this year though plastic, glass still going to landfill

Rebecca Alty, Yellowknife's mayor, says "not a lot" has changed since a revelation a few years ago that some materials from the city's recycling program were ending up in the landfill.

64 tonnes of plastic, 6 tonnes of glass landfilled via city's recycling program in 2021

Plastic inside one of the bins at Yellowknife's sorting stations on Feb. 26. The city collected 64 tonnes of plastic from these bins in 2021, all of which was buried in the landfill. (Liny Lamberink/CBC)

Yellowknife is projected to spend nearly half a million dollars on its recycling program this year, but the city's mayor says "not a lot" has changed since a revelation in 2019 that several materials being carefully sorted were ending up in the landfill anyway.

Sixty-four tonnes of plastic were collected at Yellowknife's blue bin sorting stations and landfilled in 2021, Aimee Dentinger, a communications officer for the city, said in an email. Likewise, six tonnes of glass were collected, crushed and placed in the landfill too, she said.

So what is the point of a recycling program that doesn'trecycle plastic or glass?

The vast majority of material collected through the city's recycling program is cardboard and other paper products. And the majority of that is, actually, being sold on the recycling market.

Of the 1,197 tonnes of cardboard that was collected in 2021, the city said 820 tonnes were sold and the remaining 377 tonnes were used at the dump as cover. (Liny Lamberink/CBC)

Dentinger said 1,197 tonnes of cardboard and other fibres were collected last year. Of that, 820 tonnes were sold and the remaining 377 tonnes including whatever is considered "contaminated" were used on site, she said.

"The landfill is a bit like a lasagna," said Yellowknife Mayor Rebecca Alty. "You have to put garbage, and then you got to put a cover, and then you gotta put garbage."

If it didn't use cardboard for this purpose, said Alty, the city would need to buy another material to use as a cover. In April last year, Christopher Vaughn, the city's manager of sustainability and solid waste, told CBC News that compost was being used for the same purpose.

"We're actually required to cover our active landfill with anywhere from 15 to 45 centimetres of soil," he said at the time. "It's not as easy to produce that soil in the North, so using the low-grade compost is another way to save costs."

A recycling sorting station at the Solid Waste Facility in Yellowknife on Sept. 2, 2021. (Liny Lamberink/CBC)

How Yellowknife's cardboard is 'better'

Alty said if everybody threw everything in the garbage instead, materials could not be used productively on site. She also said because residents sort their materials, Yellowknife's cardboard has "been deemed to be better" than cardboard from other markets.

"What you see down South is everyone throws their stuff in together, so then you could have those plastic yogurt containers in with the cardboard and maybe somebody hasn't cleaned it properly," she explained. "By the time they sort their recycling down South, you have more contamination between the cardboard and the tins and the plastics."

The city brought in $38,000 selling recycling last year, said Dentinger.It had initially expected to make $60,000 of the sale of recycling in 2021, she said.

Tin is also being collected and baled for sale a shift from how it, too, was being landfilled in 2019 but Dentingersaid the city didn't collect enough of the material last year to sell it. She said it'll remain baled, on site, until it can be sold.

Lisette Self said she'll continue to sort her recycling as long as the City of Yellowknife continues to operate its blue bins. 'If the matter is that there is no market anymore, then just get rid of it until there is a market.' (Liny Lamberink/CBC)

But when it comes to glass and plastic, the city is still stuck.

Municipalities throughout Canada have struggled to find a market for used plastics after China, which used to be a primary importer of the world's recyclables, banned 24 types of recyclables and solid waste at the start of 2018. Glass, meanwhile, "cannot be safely shipped to out-of-territory" markets because of its "fragility," said Dentinger.

Alty said the federal and territorial governments are exploring extended producer responsibilitypolicies, which would make product and packaging producers responsible for properly managing materials once they reach the end of their life shifting the responsibility away from consumers and municipalities.

The Yukon has committed to implementing an extended producer responsibility framework by 2025. The N.W.T. does not have such a policy, but it is highlighted as a goal in the territory's waste management strategy and implementation plan.

Recycling as a 'good practice'

Alty said people should also continue to sort plastic, glass, tin and cardboardso the city can adapt "right away" if a solution is found.

After carefully sorting her recycling at the blue bins near the Yellowknife Co-op on Wednesday, Lisette Self told CBC News she knows some of the materials will get landfilled regardless.

"I will continue [to sort recyclables] as long as we have the bins here because I feel they must be looking for markets," she said. "We're doing our part and now you have to do your part, as the city. If the matter is that there is no market anymore, then just get rid of it until there is a market."

Caleb Larocque said he'll continue to sort his recycling checking to make sure each plastic type is accepted by the city's program even though he knows it'll end up in the landfill. 'One day, when they do finally start recycling it properly, I'll already be doing my part,' he said. (Liny Lamberink/CBC)

Caleb Larocque said he was disappointed to find out how much material is landfilled a few years ago, but he'll continue to check the type of each plastic he brings to the sorting station. (The city only accepts plastic types 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7.)

"I go through the effort because it's just good practice," he said, after dropping off some cardboard and mixed paper. "One day, when they do finally start recycling it properly, I'll already be doing my part. I'd rather just keep in the routine."

According to its current budget, the city expects to make $20,000 on selling recyclingthis year, while waste recyclingis expected to cost $469,000.