On 1/16/04 3:56 PM, "Dan McConnell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I was under the impression that the reason for recycling was to reduce the > amount of materials that end up in a landfill, not to provide additional > income to the city. While I don't think that making more money off of this > program is a bad idea, I do think that by making the process less confusing > / time consuming for residents will ultimately increase participation which > I think should be the ultimate goal.
That's absolutely correct that the reason for recycling is to reduce materials going to landfills. However, it's not as simple as just collecting the stuff. In order to keep materials out of landfills, they have to have someone who wants to make something out of them in order to close the loop. That's what is being measured by the value being placed on our recyclables through the marketing agreements. The fact that Minneapolis is getting such good offers means that folks want our recyclables - so we must be doing something right. My question in return is - what makes you think there is a problem with participation that could be helped through single-stream collection? From what I've seen, residential recycling rates in Minneapolis are pretty high. Where we could stand to see improvement is recycling at apartment buildings, which has to be contracted by individual building owners/managers along with garbage service. I still see too many apartment buildings that don't offer recycling service to residents. On 1/16/04 8:59 AM, "Dee Long" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > When we moved to Minnetonka last summer, my husband called the city to enquire > about recycling rules, day of pickup, etc. He was told by a Minnetonka > employee that Mpls. only requires separation to "make the residents feel good" > about the program. > > It is a little bit easier for us to toss all the cans, glass and plastics > together, but what we really appreciate is the weekly pickup. In Mpls, it was > always "is this recycling pickup week?" We still separate the newspapers, > cardboard, grocery bags, etc. > > I'd be curious as to the extra costs of post-collection separation. That response is typical of municipalities that have missed the boat with regards to recycling. They see recycling only as a service to provide simply because they know residents want it, rather than seeing it as a way to lessen our environmental impacts and be a more efficient society. Those folks buy the song and dance about single-stream being easier because they're not worried about what happens to the materials after being collected - all they concern themselves with is their one step in the process. The cost of simplicity in this case can be seen in the marketing agreements. Materials collected through single-stream collection doesn't get the same kind of prices as source-separated. In the contract review that was done for the city, the one company that provided a single-stream bid was BFI, and their marketing offer would provide less than half the revenue of their offer under the source-separated system. Why? Because BFI would have to do the separation themselves, including separating out the non-recyclables that invariably get into the bins, along with spend extra time and money cleaning materials because people tend to get sloppy with single-source collection. I'm not sure why that is, but my theory is that it's TOO easy. People don't think about it as much as they have to with source-separation and their failure to pay attention leads to screw-ups. On 1/16/04 8:04 AM, "Leurquin, Ronald" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Mark is correct that Mpls has put a lot of effort into teaching us how to > recycle, and I am grateful to live in a city that takes it as seriously as > Mpls does. I have only ever had one frustration with Mpls's system, plastics. > Almost all plastic products have a triangular label with a number in the > center on it denoting the type of plastic. Mpls has never been able to tell > me which numbers to recycle, they just describe the type of plastic containers > they will accept. > > Mpls, please tell me what numbers you recycle, not what types of containers. > Thanks. I think this is a case where we should be careful what we wish for because we just might get it. The problem with identifying through the coding system is that it's too ambiguous. I can have a plastic container labeled with #2 (high-density polyethylene or HDPE) and some of them are recyclable, like milk jugs, but others are not, like yogurt cups. Some plastics are extremely versatile and can be used in a variety of ways. Not all of those ways are conducive with being recyclable, however. Unless people think it's harder to identify containers than to learn the difference between blow-molded HDPE and injection-molded HDPE or rigid polystyrene and expanded polystyrene, switching from container identification to the numbering system would probably make our collection system harder, not easier. On 1/17/04 11:24 AM, "Jennifer Pederseb" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I don't think the sorting is too much trouble, especially if it makes the > program more affordable for the city. Pickup every week would be really > nice, though. We just went back to shredding and composting all our junk > mail because 2 weeks of it was more space than we had for recycling storage. This is actually a good case for why Eureka Recycling would make a better partner for Minneapolis Solid Waste and Recycling than Waste Management would. Both offer collection of junk mail, but Eureka goes a step further and runs a program to educate people on how to reduce the amount of junk mail they get in the first place. Similarly, Eureka offers educational materials for folks who would like to compost at home, something that both Minneapolis and Hennepin County have been trying to promote. One of the strongest aspects of working with Eureka is their mission includes promoting waste reduction, not just recycling. And they do walk their talk. Eureka was one of the sponsors of last year's Living Green Expo on the State Fairgrounds. They worked with exhibitors in preparation of the event to minimize packaging and waste. They also staffed the event to educate visitors about recycling and composting. The result was a combined 93% recycling and composting rate and only about 2,400 pounds of garbage produced during the two-day event. Since there were about 12,000 attendees, that works out to about two-tenths of an ounce of garbage per attendee. Waste Management couldn't pull that off in their wildest dreams! By the way, the 2004 Living Green Expo will take place May 1-2, and will again be held at the State Fairgrounds. Mark Snyder Windom Park REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
