Garbage cans will be removed from the workstations of City Hall employees in the new year.

Starting Jan. 2, employees are being asked to toss their waste in containers that will be set up in centralized kitchen areas. Every office is getting a kitchen catcher for green bin waste and a small recycling bin for typical blue bin material. Workstations will continue to have recycling bins for paper.

River Coun. Maria McRae and public works GM Larry O’Keefe are telling council it’s all in the name of promoting recycling.

So, City Hall is trying to walk the walk when it comes to the “zero waste” mantra.

I hope City Hall will add some green bins to the public areas on the second floor so anyone who doesn’t have a centralized kitchen can easily toss out their organics.

(Not coincidentally, the press bureaus are on the second floor).

And, there seems to be proof!

River Coun. Maria McRae posted this picture on Twitter earlier today. That’s city manager Kent Kirkpatrick and city solicitor and clerk Rick O’Connor inking the deal between the city and Plasco Engergy Group.

It was a year in the making. The contract was expected to be signed Friday but it seems they need a bit more time to check the fine print. I guess when you’ve been waiting for a year, what’s one more night?

It’s a Plas-go.Looking forward to construction of @plasco commercial site. #OttCity lockerz.com/s/269197592

— Maria McRae (@CouncillorMcRae) December 15, 2012

Some chatter during yesterday’s environment committee meeting got people wondering about Kanata South Coun. Allan Hubley’s idea to collect all trash in one lump and have the city pick out the recyclables.

But according to River Coun. Maria McRae’s email to council this morning, the province requires the city to have a recycling box program. The question now is, should Ottawa have just one recycling box, and you see below that McRae is warning her colleagues there would likely be extra costs.

From: McRae, Maria
Sent: June 20, 2012 8:05 AM
To: =City Council
Subject: Single Stream Recycling

Good morning City Council Colleagues:

I have received inquiries this morning as to the option of collecting all solid waste materials into one container and paying additional costs to have these materials sorted off site. To clarify, under Provincial Regulation 101, all municipalities in Ontario with a population over 5000 are mandated to offer a source separated recycling program. Therefore, Ottawa is required by Provincial law to offer a blue/black box program. However, the City can determine if it wants to co-mingle these recyclables and collect them in one container (single stream recycling) and pay to have them sorted at Municipal Recycling Facility (“MRF”). This is an option that residents can select as part of the Ottawa Waste Plan consultation process. There is a cost attached to this option, as processing costs will go up and the market value of the materials will go down (due to contamination).

There is no single stream MRF in Ottawa. Therefore, if this option is selected, the City will either build its own MRF (an option in the Ottawa Waste Plan for both co-mingled and source sorted recyclables), look to a partner to build and operate one for us, or look at trucking our recyclables out of Ottawa and contracting the use of a single stream MRF in another municipality (provided there is the capacity available in that municipality’s MRF). Again, these options have additional costs associated with them.

Collection costs for single stream recyclables may also negate some of the savings realized in the new Solid Waste Collection contract. The new contract calls for one truck to pick up source separated organics on one side of the vehicle and blue/black box materials (alternating each week) on the other side. With co-mingled blue and black box materials, a different vehicle may be required due to volumes of materials collected.

There is no option to collect organics co-mingled with blue/black box recyclables at this time.

All of these options are on the table during Phase 2 of the Ottawa Waste Plan consultation process (ending at the end of September) and I look forward to hearing from our residents in this regard.

I will send a French version of this info as soon as possible.

With regards,

Maria

We’re talking about the 30-year waste plan for Ottawa at the environment committee right now and there’s an interesting history of recycling in one of the reference documents.

City of Ottawa recycling history

1983: Collection of paper, cardboard, plastics, metals and glass

1990: Distribution of backyard composters

1992: Hosting of household hazardous waste depots

1997: Take It Back partnership with retailers

1999: Dual stream blue and black box recycling

1999: Spring and fall leaf and yard collection

1999: Christmas tree collection

2006: Yellow bag program for commercial waste

2007: Hosting of electronic waste events

2007: Giveaway weekends

2009: Battery collection receptacles at city facilities

2010: Green bin program

Businesses are hungry for those bags of trash in bins outside restaurants, hospitals and schools.

Taggart Construction and Miller Waste Systems, under the name Taggart Miller Environmental Services, want to build a new dump and recycling centre in the east end, whether it be inside city boundaries or just outside.

Meanwhile, Waste Management has plans for its own garbage processing operation at the Carp Rd. dump (pictured).

You see a bag of garbage. They see a bag of money.

Apparently there’s a hot market for waste disposal in the industrial, commercial and institutional sector, which has provincial oversight.

The similarities between the Waste Management project and the Taggart Miller proposal struck me while writing the story yesterday. Nigel Guilford, head of Miller Waste Systems, said the Taggart Miller project is a first for Ontario, but I suggested it sounded a lot like Waste Management’s plan in the west end.

Guilford described the Waste Management project like this: “To me it’s a disposal site. It’s a disposal site with some waste diversion on the front end.”

Like the Waste Management folks, the Taggart Miller people are pumping up its recycling plans. More businesses want to go green and find waste processors with recycling programs.

So maybe Guilford’s observation of Waste Management’s proposal is simply that, an observation. But it sounded to me like a bit of a zinger directed at the competition.

Anyway, if you’re looking for more information about the Waste Management and Taggart Miller proposals, here are the links to their websites:

Waste Management’s West Carleton Environmental Centre
Taggart Miller’s Capital Region Resource Recovery Centre

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Follow City Hall reporter Jon Willing on Twitter at @JonathanWilling and at ottawasun.com.