Medicine Hat city council has approved a new solid waste diversion strategy that will include seeking out grant funding to develop a food-waste composting program.--News Photo Collin Gallant
cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant
About one-third of what goes into trash bins in Medicine Hat is being kept out of the city’s dump, but officials say more can and should be done to extend the life of the landfill.
That could include exploring bringing a pilot project to separate and compost food waste, according to a new 10-year waste solid management plan adopted Monday by city council.
If fully implemented it could boost diversion by one quarter and, along with other recommendations in the report extend the operational lifespan of the landfill by 15 years to 2059.
“About 35 per cent of the grey cart material is organic waste, and a great opportunity to divert material from the landfill,” said Jamie Garland, the city’s director of environmental utilities. “In the grand scheme of things it’s 10,000 tonnes in organic material in the grey cart and that equates to our goal to divert 5,000 to 6,000 tonnes of material in early years on an organics composting program.”
Coun. Alison Van Dyke said often gets questions from Hatters about the potential for food waste collection.
“Questions about kitchen waste collection are plentiful when I’m out, usually from people who have lived somewhere that has it,” said Van Dyke, citing Calgary, Edmonton and Lethbridge as cities that have three-bin pickup, including organics (combined yard and food).
“Hatters do a good job with the grey and blue bins, and I think people will do a good job with this.”
The new plan is an overhaul of the original 10-year waste strategy passed in 2011 and updated in 2016, after which the city introduced “blue cart” mix recyclables pickup.
The new top-four near-term priorities are listed as advancing food waste collection, boosting education about recyclable material, expanding recycling pickup to multi-family and commercial customers and developing a strategy for the construction and demolition industry to reduce loads.
Included is a survey of grey (trash) bin contents over the last three years which found that contents were generally evenly split in thirds by organic material, general refuse and traditional recyclable material, about half the latter being clean cardboard. Four-fifths of the organic material was essentially food waste.
In 2020 the landfill buried 84,000 tonnes of material while recycling programs like yard waste, paper, tin and plastic recycling, along with e-waste and hazardous waste programs, totalled 46,000 tonnes.
Items like carrot peels and coffee grounds are easily composted with other yard and garden waste that is already collected in warmer months in green bins and composted on site at the landfill.
Other food items, like grease, meat, dairy and bones, are also compostable, but in a more intense process and generally requiring an enclosed facility to speed up process and deter pests.
That led Coun. Darren Hirsch to question administrators about eventual costs.
“There will be a cost to full implementation, but the cost of (commissioning) a new landfill would be much more,” said Garland, saying that initially one or two communities would take part in a pilot, receive information and likely keep kitchen waste separate and add it to green bins.
Final details and locations are to be determined, but later in the meeting council approved pending up to an estimated $1-million pilot program budget. Half the cost could be covered by federal grants, but a spending and operational commitment from the department is required to secure the grant, Garland said.
The report was scheduled to come to council earlier this fall but was referred back to committee then presented Monday.
Coun. Ramona Robins said she has a high interest in taking action to help the environment but isn’t likely to compost on her own.
“It’s a way to compost without the compilations of managing my own compost – I haven’t so far,” she said.
The department will also begin folding in the provincial government’s recently adopted “Extended Producer Liability” program.
Implementation is underway, but the basic system charges the initial product producer to cover costs of disposal or recycling. It could present municipalities new revenue to cover costs of expanding recycling programs.
