A crew from GFL collects recycling from residential carts on the Southeast Hill in this March 2024 file photo.--News File Photo
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The City of Medicine has signed on to a plan to reduce recycling fees paid by residents, but by how much and who would collect cans, paper, plastic and cardboard in the future is still to be determined.
Extended Producer Liability (EPL) is a system that would see companies that produce the material charged for the eventual cost of recycling it to keep it out of landfills.
Alberta adopted the system used in other provinces in 2022 and now details are being finalized before it is implemented in April 2025. That includes a final decision on whether cities would still be responsible for operating or contracting recycling pick up.
“Residents won’t notice a difference in service,” said Shane Briggs, the superintendent of solid waste collection. “But it should go a ways on their utility bill.”
Residential customers currently pay 27 cents per day, or about $8 per month for curb side collection.
Four years ago the city backed an Alberta Municipalities proposal to have the province join the EPL system like other provinces. It charges manufacturers and produces a provincial surcharge, which funds recycling and waste diversion programs.
However, that means a new provincial agency mandate for the Alberta Recycling Management Authority must be created.
Still to be determined are fees for companies as well as eventual responsibility for collection – either directly by municipalities, or through contracted service, either paid directly or refunded.
Currently, Ontario, British Columbia and New Brunswick refund 100 per cent of municipalities’ costs, while municipalities in Saskatchewan and Manitoba receive a 70 to 80 per cent refund.
Any financial difference to the City of Medicine Hat, either through refund or handing off a local collection contract, would be applied to local residential bills, said Briggs.
Since 2018, the city has contracted waste collection companies to collect blue bins at residential doorsteps and process the plastic, cardboard and tin.
That amounted to 6,000 tonnes in 2024 from drop-off depots and residential bins handled by GFL, which signed a 10-year contract with the city in 2020.
E360, which held the original contract with the city, now provides the residential service in Redcliff.
Town council discussed the issue Monday, as did the City of Brooks, which joins 90 per cent of Alberta municipalities by signing on for inclusion.
More information should be available after meetings in Lethbridge on June 25.
Medicine Hat is now certifying its volumes and assessing its equipment value – the blue bins that were bought six years ago when the municipal sorting facility was sold to the contract provider, then E360.
