Putting Used Materials Back to Work:
A Strategy for the Long Term

20th Annual Canadian Waste Management Conference
September 21 - 24, 1998

We are at a crossroads in materials management in Canada. One road leads us down the well trodden path of treating used materials as waste and the other less travelled road takes us toward treating used materials as valuable industrial materials.

The traditional view places responsibility for used materials with municipalities, which collect them for recycling, composting or disposal. The manufacturers and suppliers of the materials assume no responsibility for them since they view the materials as wastes, which are no longer of value to them.

An emerging alternative view places responsibility for used materials with the producer and consumer since the producer decides on the design and content of the product and its package, and the consumer makes choices on what to purchase, although these choices are limited by what is available in the marketplace. Instead of treating the used good as waste, the producer views the used good as a potential opportunity for remanufacturing, reuse or recycling and arranges to take it back from the consumer to capitalize on these opportunities. Assuming responsibility in this way, leads the manufacturer to make improvements in design and packaging to reduce resource use and environmental impact, and to save money, as well as to facilitate reuse and recycling. The used good becomes part of the manufacturer's production loop rather than a municipal waste.

The Citizens' Network on Waste Management endorses this emerging view. Our position is based on the experiences of citizens' groups from throughout Ontario who have had to live with the consequences of our failure to properly handle used materials. Our goals are:

At the core of the shift that is needed is to make decisions on the basis of recognizing that used materials are not garbage, something to be gotten rid of, but are valuable resources to be preserved and reused. The waste management system should be transformed into a used materials management system.

This paper focuses on the 33 million tonnes of materials generated each year in Canada that are generally referred to as solid wastes.

The Environmental Imperative

The environmental motivations behind our current waste management systems are the hazards created by waste disposal. Waste disposal releases greenhouse gases, toxic air contaminants, and toxic contaminants to ground and surface waters, causes fires and explosions, noise, dust, odours, litter, and attracts rats, birds and insects, and creates aesthetic concerns. But even more serious are the problems created before waste disposal - the problems created because we have to produce more products because we waste valuable used materials.

Wasted Resources:
Every time something is landfilled or burned in an incinerator or energy from waste plant valuable resources are lost. This means that more raw materials are extracted from the environment to create replacement or new products. This increased extraction adds to the perpetuation and increase in the devastation created by current forestry and mining practices.

The devastation to the environment is substantially greater at the production end than at the disposal end in the lifecycle of a product. Production processes in our society result in 94% of the materials extracted being turned into waste before we even see the product.

Increased Energy Use:
Making products from raw materials usually requires substantially more energy than reusing materials or making the same product from recycled material. For example, reuse of glass containers saves 80% of the energy used to make glass. It takes 25 times as much energy to make an aluminum item from raw materials as from recycled aluminum. It takes almost twice as much energy to make a cereal box from raw materials as from recycled boxboard. As a result, municipal waste adds to the environmental impacts, including climate change, from energy production.

Reduced Contamination in the Production Stages:
Reducing the amount of materials thrown away as waste reduces the amount of new production and, as a result, reduces the contamination of air, water and land. For example, producing recycled paper results in 75% less air pollution and 35% less water pollution than making a paper product from trees. When scrap iron is used instead of ore to make steel, mining wastes are reduced by 97%, air pollution by 86% and water pollution by 76%. It also reduces the production of hazardous wastes.

Reduced Use of Water:
It usually takes more water to make an item from raw materials than from recycled materials or to reuse a product. For example, it requires 60% less water to make paper from recycled fibres than from trees.

The Used Materials Management System

Use and Waste Reduction:
We have failed at the reduction aspect of solid waste. For example, between 1987 and 1996, wastes generated in the residential sector in Ontario increased by 27% while the population increased by only 15%.

Our waste reduction efforts usually focus on lessening the amount of materials used in a product or package. This includes, for example, light-walling the container or increasing the efficiency of the manufacturing processes by using fewer resources. While such initiatives are essential, they are not sufficient.

The flip side of high waste production levels in our society is the high levels of consumption. These levels have been growing dramatically during this century. In the U.S. the population tripled between 1900 and 1989. During the same period, the consumption of raw materials grew by seventeen times. Per capita consumption in the U.S. has increased by 45% in the past twenty years. The patterns have been very similar in Canada.

Canada and the U.S. have approximately 5% of the world's population but consume more than a third of the world's resources. If everyone on the planet had a lifestyle similar to the average North American, we would require three Earth's. Calculations have been made to determine an individual's "fair Earthshare" if resources and assimilative capacity were equally divided among the Earth's inhabitants. Just purchasing and disposing of the Globe and Mail each day uses up 10% of an individual's "fair Earthshare."

Focus on used materials management means that we must develop lifestyles and provide consumer choices that encourage us to live better with less. It also means that products should be designed to last longer and to be repairable.

Use reduction should also focus on eliminating the use of hazardous materials in the production of products.

Producer Responsibility

Full producer responsibility is a growing global trend. The basis of the movement is the "polluter pays" principle. A key component of producer responsibility is the requirement for industry to take back what it produces after the consumer is finished using it to accept responsibility for the product throughout its entire life-cycle. The takeback principle encourages companies to use fewer resources in the production process, to design for reuse and remanufacturing, and to become more eco-efficient.

Companies are finding that product takeback is cheaper, more efficient, and better for the environment if their products are designed to minimize waste and to make reuse and recycling easier. At the forefront of the product takeback movement in manufacturing is the electronics industry. As well, other sectors in both Europe and North America such as manufacturers of appliances, office equipment, automobiles, cameras and paper are becoming very active in takeback programs. A recent Canadian example, "Charge Up to Recycle", is a nickel-cadmium battery recycling program launched across Canada in September 1997 by the Canadian Battery Association in cooperation with the Rechargeable Battery Association.

Deposit-Return Systems:
The most effective way to ensure that product takeback systems work is through deposit-return systems. Recovery rates for deposit-return systems are much higher than curbside programs. For example, recovery rates for deposit-return systems for beverage containers range from 72% to 98%. The best curbside programs for beverage containers achieve less than 70% recovery.

Deposit-return systems around the world collect a wide array of materials such as beverage containers (e.g., Canada, United, States, Europe, and Latin America), car batteries (e.g., Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Washington), commercial-size pesticide containers (e.g. Maine), and car bodies (e.g. Norway and Sweden).

The used materials management system should make extensive use of deposit-return systems. This should start with all beverage containers, which is already used extensively in all provinces except Manitoba and Ontario. Deposit-return systems should be extended to other products such as household hazardous waste products and packaging (e.g. used solvent containers, pesticides, batteries and corrosives) and durables (e.g. appliances, computers and electronic equipment).

For such a system to work, it must be mandated by regulation. The regulations should include requirements for levels of reuse and recycling that must be met.

Convenient return to retail with adequate compensation for retailers is a key component of the new used materials management system. Retailers must be fully compensated for the storage and handling of the returned items.

Technology has made it easier for retailers to handle and store returned items. For example, Kensington Beverage Corporation of Port Coquitlam, BC is marketing a refillable beverage system to retailers in Canada and the United States. Customers return to the store with their empty beverage containers and place them in a machine that automatically washes and refills them. Another option is reverse vending machines. In this system, customers place empty containers into the vending machine and automatically receive a redemption receipt. Costco and Fred Meyer in the United States are currently using this vending equipment.

Emphasis on Reuse and Refill:
Reuse and refill should be emphasized to minimize the use of new raw materials and to decrease the consumption of energy.

Some companies are using the refillables option. Approximately 90% of The Beer Store's sales in Ontario are in refillable containers. A winery near Toronto has just introduced returnable-refillable wine bottles. Refillable milk containers are now used in some dairies in London, St. Thomas, Simcoe, Brantford, Stratford, Woodstock, Hamilton, Burlington, Ottawa, Carleton and Toronto.

Reuse has become a major activity in the product distribution system. Reuse accounted for almost half of the packaging used in 1996. This is overwhelmingly accounted for by the reuse of wood and plastic pallets for carrying products.

Refillable beverage containers are common in many European countries. For example, in Denmark, 97% of all beverage containers are refillable; in Germany, 76% of soft drinks are in refillables; in Austria, 95% of mineral water is in refillables; in Norway, 60% of wine and liquor is in refillables.

Each province should introduce regulations that contain increasing targets for reuse and refill for specified items. This should lead to the phase-out of certain non-reusable products and non-refillable containers. For example, items such as disposable cameras and razors should be banned. A good place to begin with requirements for refillables is all beverage containers.

Community reuse facilities should also be set up.

Composting:
Approximately one-quarter of the solid wastes generated in Canada are organics that are compostable. Approximately 37% of residential waste is compostable. In 1992, only 1.2% of the solid waste in Canada was composted.

Apartment and condominium complexes should set up small-scale composting facilities for each building. In addition, neighbourhood composting facilities should be set up. The use of centralized composting facilities should be minimized, since there tends to be greater contamination of the compost that is produced in these facilities.

Restaurants and grocery stores, as well as other industrial, commercial and industrial facilities, should send their organic wastes for reuse or composting.

Curbside and Depot Collection:
Curbside and depot collection should be set up only for the used materials that are not covered by take-back and deposit-return systems, or backyard or community composting facilities. For example, recyclables such as newsprint, old corrugated cardboard and fine paper as well as containers that do not lend themselves to return systems would continue to be collected in curbside recycling systems or at recycling depots in smaller communities. Other products such as non-recyclable fibres, brush and trees that do not break down well in backyard composters could be collected at curbside and taken to community or centralized composting facilities.

Residuals to Cleaner Disposal:
Reusables, compostables, recyclables and hazardous materials should be banned from disposal.

With diversion rates of at least 80% by 2,000 in the new used, materials management system, disposal facilities would be much smaller. As well, with the prohibition of both hazardous materials and compostables from disposal, the production of leachate will be decreased and will be less hazardous. It will be possible to develop dry fills and disposal facilities that are specially designed for the specific materials being sent to them. The large, multi-material, mixed waste landfill will be an historic artifact. Such smaller, less hazardous facilities will allow for more flexibility in siting and will be more acceptable to communities.

Disposal facilities should be located in the community where the wastes are generated. This will encourage local residents to be more responsible since it will make them have to live with the consequences of any bad decisions they make in the used materials management system. This approach is also essential for environmental justice reasons.

Incineration and energy from waste plants should not be part of the disposal option. They waste valuable used materials and are a very inefficient energy source. They also are a major source of environmental contamination from their stack emissions and the ash left over from the burning process.

Payment for Collection, Recycling, Composting and Disposal:
In the used materials system, most costs will be covered directly by the producers, brand owners and distributors of the product through take-back systems.

The cost of handling those materials that are still left for the municipality to take care of, i.e., going into the curbside and depot system, should be handled to the largest extent possible by the producers of the products. There may be some costs left over that cannot be reasonably allocated back to the producers of the products. These costs could be recovered through user fees charged to the residents, institutions, industry and commercial operations that use the system. A properly set up user fee system will encourage people to properly use the used materials system, i.e., encourage them not to throw away valuable used materials.

Public Control:
Local people should have control over the used materials management strategy in their community. For example, a disposal facility should not be located in a neighbourhood unless the local people willingly accept it. No one community should be the repeated recipient of undesirable used materials management facilities. Community monitoring committees should be set up for used materials management facilities on which local neighbours form the majority. If the community is not satisfied that the promises made when the facility was approved are being met, the community should be able to close down the facility.

Enhanced Environmental and Economic Vitality

A used materials management system such as that described in this paper will result in substantial reductions in environmental damage. By reducing the environmental damages discussed at the beginning of this presentation, the used materials management system will contribute to a healthier environment and to the well-being of all those who live on Earth.

Long-term economic vitality is also dependent on making the transition from a wasteful society to a conserver society. The used materials approach, based on reusing valuable resources and reducing the consumption of raw resources and energy, ensures an economy that has the materials needed to produce the items that we and future generations will need. An economy focused on reusing and recycling used materials will also increase employment.

A study by the Tellus Institute for Resource and Environmental Strategies compared the economic impacts of increasing the proposed waste diversion targets for the Greater Toronto Area from 50% to 80%. They calculated that an approach similar to the one described in this presentation would result in avoided environmental impact costs at the production and waste management levels of approximately $311 million each year. They also concluded that the economic advantages would be:

These economic advantages were as a result of changing the waste management system in the Toronto area. Similar changes across the country would result in substantially greater economic gains and savings.

We must make the transition to a used materials management system so that this and future generations may thrive.


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