Today's Topics:
? RE: Weekly # of MSW Collections
CNN /Ted Turner / sustainability
Column #3 -- Making It Easier to Recycle
EPA LANDFILL 'CORPORATE RULE'
Landfill demand-price relationships
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Date: Fri, 06 Dec 1996 13:28:19 -0400
From: WOODY GETZ <WGETZ@FRE.FSU.UMD.EDU>
Subject: ? RE: Weekly # of MSW Collections
Dear GreenYes Folk,
I would appreciate your response to the following: "How many times per
week do the households in your community receive curbside collection of
discards which are landfilled?"
FAR (Frostburg Area Recyclers), our local citizen recycling advocacy
group, has proposed to our Mayor & City Council that the City establish
a Variable Rate Pricing (VRP) program for FYE 1998.
In looking at the many details required to move from our current "flat
fee" pricing program to a hybrid VRP system, we have had to consider our
current system of each household receiving curbside collection of
discards *TWICE* each week.
Every week half the city has curbside collection of MSW on Monday
&Thursday while the other half has curbside collection on Tuesday
&Friday. The only exceptions are 8 annual holidays and weather
interuptions. (I shovelled several inches this morning!)
These collections are landfilled at the local, privately-owned &
operated landfill, Mountainview Landfill, here in Allegany County, in
Western Maryland.
Wednesday is used for seasonal yard material collection (which is
transported to the County Compost Site) or other street related
projects.
All public recycling in our County is coordinated at the County level.
Household recyclables (newspaper, clear glass, non-clear glass, & cans)
may be deposited at any of the 16 recycling drop boxes in the County.
There is a buy-back center located in Cumberland, the County Seat.
So, are there other communities who offer twice per week curbside
collection of household solid waste?
Or, if you don't currently offer twice per week collection, did you at
some time; and then, how long ago & why did you change to once per week
collection for households?
Thanks for your time & effort!
Curious and still needing to shovel more snow,
Woody Getz
Sierra Club, Western Maryland Group/Maryland Chapter
CRoWD (Citizens for Responsible Waste Disposal)
FAR (Frostburg Area Recyclers)
Member, Allegany County Solid Waste Management Plan Committees,
1991-92 & 1995-96.
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Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 08:32:00 -0800
From: Krista_Henkels@PPS.ucsd.edu
Subject: CNN /Ted Turner / sustainability
---------------------------------- Forwarded ----------------------------------
From: mgold@OISE.UTORONTO.CA at @UCSD
Date: 12/6/96 8:36AM
*To: GRNSCH-L@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU at @UCSD
Subject: CNN /Ted Turner / sustainability
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Turner Broadcasting keeping sustainability and Agenda 21 a secret!!!!
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Does Ted Turner support sustainable development?
Please ask the question?
If Ted Turner supports sustainable development and his vice-president of
environmental affairs, Barbara Pyle, both state publically that they support
sustainable development, why will they not write a letter to other
broadcasters encouraging them to adopt policies of sustainability?
This is a question that needs to be asked of Ted Turner.
In your classroom, ask your students to write to Ted Turner and ask him
that question.
The question is: If you believe in the necessity of sustainability, why
will you not write a letter to other broadcasters encouraging them to
adopt sustainability into their policy directives?
Turner Broadcasting System
One CNN Center
Box 105366
Atlanta Ga
30348-5366
Attention TED TURNER.
Please copy such request to:
Mitchell L Gold
========================
homeplanet@homeplanet.org
mgold@oise.utoronto.ca
tel 1-416-924-4449
fax 1-416-924-4094
International Association of Educators for World Peace
c/o 2 Bloor St. West
Ste 100-209
Toronto, Ontario
M4W 3E2
Canada
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Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 19:20:03 -0800 (PST)
From: "David A. Kirkpatrick" <dkirkwks@igc.apc.org>
Subject: Column #3 -- Making It Easier to Recycle
Grassroots Recyclers -
Here is column three in the series I have forwarded to you. Thanks to those
who have made valuable editing comments on 1 and 2. I will retransmitt the
final printed versions of 1 through 3 which incorporate many of your
suggestions. This last one is meant to be practical ... how do we get there
from here. I was a bit rushed on it since it is due this weekend, with the
columns running on Sun, Mon, Tues Dec. 8-10. If any of you log on over the
weekend and have edits to suggest, please email them directly to me ASAP.
Thanks!
Dave Kirkpatrick
********************
Making It Easier to Recycle and Harder to Waste=20
Column 3 of 3 for the Herald Sun=20
How can we make garbage obsolete in Durham? By making it easy and cheap to
recycle and reduce waste and expensive and difficult to create waste. In
our homes, this means convenient, weekly collections not only for
newspapers, bottles, cans, leaves, and brush, but also for magazines, junk
mail, office paper, textiles, used oil, reusable goods and food scraps.
With all of these materials collected for recycling and composting, we
should generate very little if any waste for landfilling. =20
However, household waste is only about 1/3 of what goes in the Durham
landfill =96 the rest comes from businesses, industries, colleges and other
institutions. Each of these waste generators also need convenient
collections of the materials they generate in great quantities =96 paper=
from
offices, cardboard from retail outlets, food scraps and containers from
restaurants, and specialized scrap materials from industrial facilities. =20
If we institute more comprehensive recycling collections, though, how can we
be sure everyone participates? Some businesses and homes in Durham reduce
waste and recycle aggressively already, but many still are throwing
everything "away" =96 in the landfill. Many communities have gone to "pay=
as
you throw" programs in which each home and business pays for the full cost
of their solid waste collection and disposal, based on how much they waste.
If one printing company fills up a garbage dumpster per week, they pay
accordingly, while another printing company that recycles all of their paper
scrap avoids the waste fees and sometimes even earns recycling revenues. At
the residential level, pay-as-you-throw programs need to provide credits for
fixed or low income residents to help assure that the fees do not make the
tax structure more regressive. Everyone has the opportunity to cut waste
costs by reducing their waste at the source and recycling.
Other cities have made recycling a civic duty =96 like stopping at stop=
signs.
Easy recycling opportunities are provided for all and all are expected to
participate. Homes and businesses that mix their recyclables into waste
containers are generating more expenses and environmental liabilities and
are cited and fined accordingly. Already, the city has taken this type of
initiative with one material =96 cardboard. Businesses are provided with=
free
cardboard recycling dumpster collections and if commercial garbage trucks
dump waste loads at the landfill including cardboard, they are triple
charged tipping fees.
If we give strong economic incentives, civic requirements, and thorough
education, Durham residents will respond by recycling, composting and
reusing more and reducing waste at the source. But how will we pay for the
new recovery efforts? One way will be to cut back on mixed solid waste
collections, once we all have the opportunity to recover the majority of our
materials. In my household and home office, only about 15% of our discarded
materials goes into the garbage roll out cart, the rest are recycled or
composted. At that rate, once per month collection would be quite=
sufficient.
Currently, much of the city=92s revenue to support solid waste and recycling
programs comes from the tipping fees charged at the landfill. As of January
1, 1998, state law will require all unlined landfills, including Durham=92s,
to close. We have to have find a new way to fund our discarded materials
system. Reduced mixed solid waste collection and disposal costs, higher
recycling and composting revenues, and pay-as-you-throw fees can all be part
of the mix to address this fiscal shortfall. Durham=92s materials=
management
program, like our homes and businesses, should make money by reducing waste,
instead of having the counter productive economic incentive to landfill=
more.
The added benefits of overcoming our reliance on landfills and fostering a
sustainable materials economy can be significant. With the loss of many
cigarette manufacturing jobs, Durham needs new industries that are
accessible to skilled blue collar workers. If we keep our scrap commodities
separate, many new employment opportunities could be generated in
manufacturers using recovered materials, in repair and reuse shops, in
processing plants, in soil products companies and in collection programs.
By realizing that our "solid waste problem" is really a "commodity
manufacturing opportunity," Durham has the chance to develop a win-win=
solution.
Achieving zero waste will be a challenge for every household and business,
and especially for Durham as a whole. But what is the alternative?
Accepting the continued community divisiveness, environmental hazards, and
expenses of landfilling? Accepting the lost economic and employment
opportunities of burying valuable commodities? Surely we can do better. As
our parents and grandparents knew and our children remind us -- We can
"waste not, want not."
David Kirkpatrick
----------------------
KirkWorks
Post Office Box 15062
Durham, NC 27704-0062
919/220-8065 (Voice)
919/220-9720 (Fax)
Dkirkwks@igc.apc.org=20
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Date: Fri, 06 Dec 96 20:12:27 PST
From: jennie.alvernaz@sfsierra.sierraclub.org
Subject: EPA LANDFILL 'CORPORATE RULE'
> Thanks for posting the message about shortcomings of the likely EPA
> "corporate rule" for posting financial assurance for landfill
> maintenance. I agree that corporations are fundamentally different
> than public sector operators. The public sector always has the power to
> tax if they misjudged earlier computations.
Bill -
Just a brief note on this last sentence. One of the problems that we
counties in Wisconsin face is that our taxing power for solid waste
management was seriously curtailed by some legislation passed a number
of years ago by a coalition of the waste companies and local
municipalities. Under the interpretation of many county legal staff,
most counties cannot use property taxes to fund solid waste systems.
This, of course, makes the development and operation of county solid
waste systems problematic, and is part of our big battle to establish
integrated systems.
John
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Date: Fri, 6 Dec 1996 11:27:31 CDT
From: "John Reindl 608-267-8815" <reindl@co.dane.wi.us>
Subject: Landfill demand-price relationships
In a previous message, a question was posed on the impact that landfill
prices may have on the amount of waste that gets landfilled versus
diverted.
One interesting article that contains some information on this is found
on the Waste Prevention Association webpage at
http://www.rec.hu/poland/wpa/wastax.htm
In addition, for those of who download htm and html documents from the
Web, and then find the mark-up codes annoying, I can share with you
some software to remove these markup codes and format the document
according to the codes. Called htmstrip.*, this software is very
effective and efficient, and I would be glad to send it to anyone (it's
also freeware).
John Reindl
Dane County, WI
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End of GreenYes Digest V96 #41
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