Reduce, Reuse and Maybe Recycle

This morning, the Ontario Centre for Engineering and Public Policy (OCEPP) and the Ontario Society of Professional Engineers (OSPE) put on a joint breakfast forum, discussing Ontario’s Waste Diversion Act with guest speakers TTC chair Adam Giambrone, former director of Waste Diversion Ontario, Gillian Seagrave , and Maureen Carter-Whitney with the Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy.

The common theme that rung through the three presentations was the need to use more of the first two ‘R’s’ (reduce, reuse) before we look to more recycling. All three spoke about the need for levies on landfills to even the playing field between recycling and landfilling—it costs significantly more to recycle a product than to disposing of it. European countries and Australia have been able to increase diversion from landfills by equalizing the economic cost of disposal and recycling.

All three also spoke on the need for extended producer responsibility or product stewardship as part of the future for waste diversion. Product stewardship captures the environmental costs of goods throughout their life cycle, which are then incorporated into the total cost.

Seagrave talked about her work with government and industry towards developing cost sharing on the municipal blue bin recycling programs.

Carter-Whitney also talked about cost sharing in products and how the increased cost for diversion would be borne by the consumer—a cost the government wants to hide. She believes that if this cost was transparent, it would help consumers decide what products to buy. That’s assuming as a society we’re becoming more sensitive to the environmental costs and are letting that influence our purchasing choices.

Although there was limited time for much audience participation, the speaker’s presentations summed up the short-term future for Ontario’s Waste Diversion Act.

Follow this link to read a review of the 2002 Waste Diversion Act.