A quick peek into Flagstaff Waste’s new recycling program

The board and management of Flagstaff Waste Management, which is owned by every municipality in Flagstaff as well as Rosalind, have taken a hard look at the current household recycling materials market, and will be making some changes at the end of the summer.

Under the new program, yellow commingled bins and mixed paper bins will be removed from all current collection centres.

In their place, 12 collection centres will receive “Newsprint only” bins, “Bond paper only” bins, “Tin Cans Only” bins, and newly labelled “#1 and #2 Plastics only” bins (the former commingled bins will be re-labelled and reused for plastics).

Each recycling centre will retain their compost collection bins, and their cardboard recycling bins.

Waste Management Diversions Operations Coordinator David Dahl says, “By modifying our program to separate various materials, we lower contamination levels, which ensures we receive top value for recycled commodities.”

Flagstaff Waste will monitor use and will modify frequency of collection to ensure that each centre is nearing capacity when it’s time to collect.

That ensures that the program runs as efficiently as possible for trucks and drivers, too.

As the market has shifted since China essentially closed its doors to all but the cleanest plastic, options for marketing mixed loads of recycling are not feasible.

Residents continue to demonstrate a clear desire to recycle, so the program has shifted to align better with what recyclables Flagstaff Waste is able to market.

When there is no market for a type of recyclable, it will go into the landfill.

Management at Flagstaff Waste hopes that education will make their recycling program a success, with fewer contaminated loads as residents separate their recyclables at source.

Information on precisely what paper is recyclable and what is not will come next in the series, as the changes in the recycling market are so volatile, we must go straight to the source to find out what they expect to see when they purchase bond and newsprint loads.