NNB News

St. Petersburg recycling

By  Kerry Louise Schofield

St. Petersburg—Fran Bruno drives her 2004 Hyundai Sonata to the recycling site in Midtown. It is stuffed with empty plastic bottles with no lids that once contained milk, soap and soda.  A secretary at James B. Sanderlin Elementary School, Bruno used to take plastics to the drop-off site almost daily in 2008 as part of the school’s recycling program. This year she stopped.

“I just got tired of my car smelling and things leaking,” Bruno said. “It was just too much for me.”

Bruno wants to recycle but thinks Florida lacks the services and facilities.  In June 2008, Florida Governor Charlie Crist signed The Energy, Climate Change and Economic Security Act of 2008, which seeks to achieve a new statewide recycling goal of 75 percent by 2020. The new recycling goal is the highest of any state in the U.S.

The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is charged with developing a comprehensive program to achieve the goal. Final recommendations will be presented to the Florida Legislature by Jan. 1, 2010. According to the 36-page draft prepared by the DEP, meeting the goal will require an effective combination of policies, programs and funding. In 2006, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency set a national recycling goal of 38 percent. The 2007 recycling rate in Florida was 28 percent, the national average.

“We feel that the new goal can be achieved, but only if all our major funding and policy recommendations are implemented,” said Ron Henricks of the DEP. “There are some communities here in the U.S. and in other nations who have an even more audacious goal of zero waste.”

Henricks said that many approaches can be taken to reach or even surpass the goal. He said local governments have indicated their willingness to help but cannot bear all the costs involved with funding various recycling programs.  The draft would impose two new funding sources—a landfill disposal charge of $1 per ton and a 10 cent per bottle beverage container deposit. The landfill disposal charge alone could generate $21 million annually. The bottle bill would conserve resources used to make bottles and reduce waste.

“It would be surprising if the Legislature accepted all of our recommendations whole cloth with no changes,” Henricks said.

The draft would implement a Pay As You Throw (PAYT) program. A PAYT program would lower the cost of waste collection for residents by giving them a financial incentive to recycle more and waste less. PAYT would also help local governments to quickly increase their residential recycling rates.  It would also set up a RecycleBank program for residents through a private organization. In a RecycleBank system, a resident could be awarded discount coupons for goods and services with local vendors in exchange for recycling more and throwing out less.

A Pinellas County Study of Waste Composition in 2007 showed that 75 percent of municipal solid waste (MSW) is burned or buried in dumps and could be recycled.

The draft would also mandate commercial recycling. Construction and demolition debris, paper, and yard trash are three of the largest groups in MSW. The commercial sector generates 66 percent of waste and recycles only 30 percent. The residential sector generates 34 percent of waste and recycles 27 percent. The recommendations conclude that both rates must be increased substantially to meet the goal.

Some additional components of the draft, which are critical to achieving the goal, include organics recycling, product stewardship and market development for recyclable materials.

“A game-changer in my opinion is organics recycling,” said Andy Fairbanks of Pinellas County Utilities Solid Waste Operations. “The organics portion of the waste stream that can be biodegraded is an enormous piece of the pie.”

Fairbanks said that organic waste accounts for 10 to 20 percent of garbage generated in the state. Organic waste is food and food packaging, yard debris, composted waste and things like wet paper towels. Organic waste is collected separately from the mainstream garbage and once it is removed, the dry waste is easier to sort. He said that Florida has a lot of organic material.  “It seems like there would be a readily available market for compost but that connection hasn’t been made yet, so the issue needs to be addressed,” Fairbanks said.

The draft would also extend the role and responsibility to producers for disposal of goods. Companies would be responsible for the entire life cycle of their products including product packaging. Product stewardship programs, like the system for rechargeable batteries enacted in 1993, create incentives to design products and packaging that is less toxic, less bulky and much lighter as well as more recyclable. These programs shift production costs to producers and consumers by adding an “eco-fee” at the point of sale.

“All of these things are connected and if we don’t have a consistent, coherent policy, then it’s really cumbersome to try to achieve some of these objectives,” Fairbanks said.

Fairbanks said that building a recycling infrastructure will cost a significant amount of money but will also create economic opportunities for blighted areas and for the state of Florida.  “I really feel like the more attention this gets, the better chance it has of being a good program as opposed to some goal we will never achieve,” Fairbanks said.

Zachary Anderson mans the St. Petersburg Recycling and Brush Site at 2500 26th Ave. S. Anderson, 58, has been a city employee for 28 years and sees firsthand what people are recycling.

People bring the usual cans, plastic, glass, paper and metals to the site, but Anderson also sees furniture, pallets, lumber, building materials and dead animals, which are not permitted.  The site is a bustling drive-through of sorts where tall mounds of brush, ready to use mulch, metal containers and plastic bins sit.

“A lot of people take advantage of the site. It’s constantly busy and is open seven days a week,” Anderson said.

Anderson gives away free firewood for barbecues and fireplaces. The Boy Scouts and Eckerd College regularly pick up wood by the truckload for events and big bonfires.

The last public hearing for Florida’s new 75 percent recycling goal will be held Nov. 5 in Tallahassee. For more information, visit the Florida DEP’s Web site at http://www.dep.state.fl.us/.