Prince George, B.C. – Word is expected very soon on the latest development in refuse re-cycling to come to Prince George.

First, though, Rachael Ryder with the Regional District of Fraser Fort George provided a history lesson at the REAPS AGM on Saturday.  The regional district took over solid waste management from the City in 1994.  Services delivered by the regional district include the Foothills landfill and the centralized composting facility located there.  It also runs a network of transfer stations throughout the regional district and operates the multi-material drop depot system for recycling.

The first Solid Waste Management Plan came out in 1997, with a lofty goal of reducing the amount of waste going into the landfill by 50%.  Each solid waste plan is to be valid from 5 to 10 years, and in 2007 a study of the landfill was undertaken to determine what was being collected in curbside garbage cans and what was being collected from commercial users of the regional transfer stations.

Ryder says “as part of this review we got input from residents on what they wanted to see in the plan and we had an overwhelming majority, greater than 96% of those who took part in it, strongly in favor of curbside recycling.  With that in mind along with several other updates and revisions, a new solid waste management plan was created in the fall of 2008 and ministry approval occurred in July of the next year.”  She says key changes from 1997 included eliminating the amount of waste being landfilled, and extending the landfill life.  Ryder says “it’s going to be really hard to find another site for a landfill, so we want to maximize the years at the current site.”  She figures Foothills has 22 years of life remaining.

Ryder says “the regional district has operated the multi-material drop depot service since 1994 and the program was set up to accept all paper fibre products, metal food and beverage containers and plastic milk jugs. “  However she says this has become a big sore point because “milk jugs are not the only plastic people use.  So they’re getting frustrated with “why is that the case?”  As she understands it, in setting up the program the regional district a “market first” approach.  “They wanted to make sure there was a viable steady market to receive these materials that we collected, and that it was going somewhere to be used in an end product.  So there’s lots of things that say they are recyclable but there’s not a huge demand for them, or they’re really hard to recycle.  We want to try and maintain a consistent process that has someplace for these items to go.”

Ryder says “this program costs taxpayers over a million dollars to operate throughout the region, and annual revenue generated from the sale of the material collected is approximately $250 thousand.  So you can see that recycling is not a huge money maker.”  The constraints of the regional district program provided the opportunity for the development of private curbside collection companies in Prince George, and they went from two to four or five, and back down to two.  As well the materials they collected varied.

Regarding the composting of yard and garden waste at Foothills, Ryder says annually we receive 5,000 tonnes of material from both our residential and commercial customers.  It costs us $125,000 to bring the material from the Quinn Street and Vanway transfer stations to Foothills, another $275,000  to process it and the revenue we generate in one year is $50,000.”  The material gets chipped up, placed in windrows and composted, and then is sold to the public.

The next development on the horizon is the Printed Paper and Packaging program, which has a goal “of putting the onus on producers to collect and recycle the products that they make and sell.  It removes the burden from taxpayers as a group, so we as consumers still pay for these programs but only when you purchase an EPR (Extended Producer Responsibility) product.”

Ryder says “the Printed Paper and Packing EPR program was added to the recycling regulation in 2011.  Producers must have a program in place by this May and have to achieve a 75% recovery rate of the products covered in this program.”  She says existing programs in the province have recovery rates of between 50 and 57% right now.

Ryder says the regional district has been looking into the program since 2011 and what it would mean to Prince George.  “So we can see that MMBC made an offer to local governments including the City of Prince George and the regional district to be collection providers of PPP materials.  Both the City and regional district declined the financial incentives as they would not fully cover the projected costs of the delivery of service.  And one of the big things about EPRs is that they’re supposed to pay for themselves.  So to be subsidized by taxpayers who are paying for it, essentially you’re paying for it twice.”  Both bodies rejected that.

MMBC then put out a Request For Proposals from companies interested in providing the collection service.  Ryder says “it’s no longer the regional district’s responsibility because we’re not involved in it because we didn’t become collectors.  But there is an announcement coming (on Blue Box curbside collection)  and May 19th, when this program is supposed to be in place is looming quite ominously around the corner so until MMBC makes that announcement there’s still a number of unanswered questions as to curbside recycling in Prince George.  Will there be curbside recycling in Prince George?  I have my fingers crossed that yes it is going to happen, we’re of a size that makes sense.”

Ryder says “I’m holding my breath waiting for this announcement to be made but if there is going to be curbside who is going to provide it, how are they going to collect it, how are they going to educate the customers and get information out there as to what is included in the program?  So there is a huge education component of it that is still quite unknown as to how that is going to be addressed.”