Time for End-to-End Redesign Garbage Management

The Ottawa Citizen's Randal Denley (Time for choice on trash pickup) suggests that "a bit of business sense would suggest the solution to the problem." That statement could not be any truer.  But the suggestion that differential service to households (bi-weekly for all, and weekly for those willing to pay) will not solve the City's garbage and recyclables collection challenge. 

"Ottawa city councillors face an apparent dilemma. Should they follow their staff’s advice and cut regular garbage collection to force people to use green bins, or should they leave things as is?"  Neither.

The City should  take a step back and examine refuse management using life cycle analysis: Focussing on collection while ignoring avoidance and reduction methods, transport, processing, recycling, disposal, new technologies, education and awareness, and needs analysis (urban, suburban, rural, across seasons) will yield disappointing results.  


We need a cost effective, more environmentally benign solution.


Already municipalities around the world have made much more progress by adopting integrated waste management strategies. Advancements include:

• The ArrowBio system (used in California, Australia, Greece, Mexico, the United Kingdom and in Israel) takes trash directly from collection trucks and separates organic and inorganic materials through gravitational settling, screening, and hydro-mechanical shredding. The system is capable of sorting huge volumes of solid waste, salvaging recyclables, and turning the rest into rich agricultural compost. Given Ottawa's vast geography (5400 kilometres of road) and high cross-contamintaion rate, centralized triage could be viable to reduce transport costs and related pollution. 
• Inexpensive technologies like RFID tags are being used to collect data on presentation rates for curb-side pick-ups.
• Integrated software packages aggregating RFID and GPS this data for use in optimisation of waste collection operations.
• Extended Producer Responsibility strategies to promote the integration of all costs associated with products throughout their life cycle, including end-of-life disposal costs, into the price of the product. Perhaps retailer 5¢ cent bag revenues should be channelled to City waste management?  
• Montreal is set to implement an Envac system in 2012 to service its downtown arts district. The system uses large, underground pneumatic tubes to distribute waste to a centralized processing facility. The process begins with the deposit of trash into intake hatches, called portholes, which may be specialized for waste, recycling, or compost. Maybe not suitable for Ottawa, but it goes to show other cities are thinking outside the box (or can).

Council: Ottawa needs and expects out the box thinking. Demand it of staff: send them back to the drawing board to define a vision for the next generation and the milestones that will get us there.

Related post: Garbage and Transit Woes Highlight Waste in City Operations

Faulty Reasoning on Garbage Woes?

City staff and Rideau-Goulbourn councillor Scott Moffatt conclude that low open house turnout suggests residents don't care about the city's plan to cut back on garbage collection:

“I’m being told that everybody opposes this. Where are they?” Moffatt asked in the arena’s mostly empty Community Hall. “If this is the issue people say it is, they should be here.” ( Ottawa Citizen)

Maybe there are other possibilities for low turnout:

• Where, when, how were the open houses advertised? 
• City Hall open house: many city centre folk (generally smaller households, many condo/ apartment dwellers that are not serviced by the City) are not impacted.
• This is 2011: virtual open houses and discussion forums...
• Poor/expensive public transit not conducive to attending;
• Similarly, availability of parking 
• Apathy: the consultation process is not taken seriously by City staff
• Staff/Council decision appears to be done deal
• etc.