Moldy fruit salad in a container? Lettuce that seems to have melted into the bag? Tossing it into the garbage might seem the easiest recourse but soon that's going to cost you extra.
Beginning in 2012, Metro Vancouver plans to impose surcharges on garbage loads that contain kitchen scraps and other soon-to-be banned organic waste.
Morganne Keplar has compiled an organic resources recovery report that is geared to assisting Bowen Island council in managing the island's waste. It includes compost and septic sludge, which, as Keplar says, "takes a different mindset to see as resources instead of waste."
The report was commissioned by the Knick Knack Nook, Bowen's re-use-it store, and Keplar will present it at the October 11 council meeting. She says, "It depends on us as a community or as individuals to decide whether we are going to take the food off island or deal with it ourselves. If we ship it off island, it will be expensive."
Keplar has looked to other places for examples. Studies show that if things are handled locally, it would be about half the cost of shipping them to a commercial facility."
Right now, she says, most of our household garbage gets taken to the North Van transfer station where it gets dispersed to landfill or incineration. About 35 per cent gets burned, the rest goes to landfill.
But sometime next year, there will be facility to accept food waste and yard trimmings.
Before that deadline arrives, Keplar says "we can begin to do as much home composting as possible. The second thing we can do is organize ourselves in neighbourhoods and combine our effort with community gardens. We start with ourselves, then we look to the neighbourhood level. And when we have exhausted those options, we see what is left."
Keplar knows of three parties on Bowen who have an interest in pursuing composting on a commercial level.
But it's not that easy to have a solid business model, and turn a profit. First, there are the tipping fees. Keplar asked, "Can you see yourself paying someone to take your food waste away?" Another consideration is the product and Keplar has looked into processes like anaerobic digestion and biochar. But for composting, wood chips are required. "You need a 30 to one ratio of carbon to nitrogen," Keplar explained. "So we need to look to companies on Bowen that could provide us with woodchips. It isn't clear that we could have a composting facility on a commercial level unless we tie in no burning laws. Then we would get the material from land clearing that now is still allowed to be burned."
This line of thinking resonates with concerns about air quality. Keplar says, "It's inevitable that we will have to address the issue [of air quality] at some point. And for the transitioning time, it is important have to have option in place." It only makes sense to have a commercial entity set up for chipping as the prices to ship the material to the mainland are steep. "One load can cost $2000," Keplar says. "That's what Eddie [Weismiller] charges and includes transportation, labour and time." And with rising fuel and ferry costs, it is not going to get any cheaper.
This is why Keplar urges the whole community to find a solution. She says, "We have to have a willing council and municipal staff." Keplar realizes that there are many other demands on the municipal coffers such as the roads, water and sewer lines. But some of the issues could be addressed by policy changes that would enable local companies to move in the right direction.
As a beginning stage, Keplar proposed to place our existing garbage in clear bags. She says, "If we go to clear bags, our service people will be able to see when recyclables, toxic waste or food are not separated. Then the bag will go back to home owner. We have to educate people to be more responsible because, even now, we are fined heavily." Our garbage contractors get spot-checked and have to pay fines if, for instance, drywall and paints are found. And that is going to happen more and more once the 2012 restriction on food and yard trimmings will be enforced.
