Item B: Sustainability Commission Recommendations

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ATTACHMENT A CITY WASTE RECOMMENDATION BACKGROUND City of Eugene shall increase the volume of waste diverted from landfill from internal operations and facilities from current levels of an estimated 45 percent to at least 75 percent by 2014 and 90 percent by 2020. Introduction The Commission seeks to build-on the work already undertaken by city staff to reduce waste from city operations. The recently adopted city sustainable procurement policy (section 6 of the City Administrative orders) provides the framework for continuing to address city waste issues at the “front-end” of decision making. Procurement of fewer products and materials as well as care taken in purchasing reusable or recyclable products are the first steps in reducing the volume of waste going to landfill. Lifecycle analyses undertaken by the USEPA estimate that for every ton of municipal discards wasted, about 70 tons of waste are produced in the life cycle to create and dispose of that product. Any additional action the city can take to reduce the purchase of products will reduce the impact we have on the environment and community. The intent of the specific recommended reduction targets is to (1) support the rethinking of the need to purchase materials in the first place, (2) enable informed procurement decisions that will reduce the creation of waste, and (3) increase the reuse or recycling of waste that cannot be avoided. The ideal is the creation of closed loop material circulation patterns where non-recyclable or reusable materials are avoided and where materials no longer needed in one product can be reused or recycled into another product. Why have a waste reduction goal? A goal provides a focus for waste reduction initiatives and enables measurement of progress towards the stated outcome. Less waste and more recycling is good for the economy, for the environment and therefore good for the community. As noted in the SBI report, research has shown that each step in the recycling process means more jobs, more business expenditure on supplies and services and more money circulating in the local economy. b Research undertaken by the EPA in 2001 indicates there is a 6 to 1 ratio for recycling jobs developed versus land filling jobs for equivalent volumes of waste created by a community. Locally, Julie Daniel, Director of BRING Recycling notes an even greater economic advantage of reuse and recycling over land-filling with a 20 to 1 ratio of jobs created based on anecdotal evaluation around the same time period. BRING is a great local case study. They employ 22 people, plus temporary help from an agency to add to deconstruction crews. They have 3.5 full time equivalents (FTEs) working in recycling to process about 2000 tons of material a year. BRING also has 12 people working in reuse and salvage, including deconstruction, sales staff, receiving staff, managers and forklift drivers to handle 1000 tons of material a year. The other staff are educators, administration, a volunteer coordinator and a development manager. All but one staff member are supported with income earned from reuse and recycling, so at BRING 3000 tons of material provides jobs for 21 FTE's annually. This amount of material could be handled by one FTE in a couple of months if it was land filled. NextStep Recycling is another excellent local example of the benefit of recycling rather than landfill waste. NextStep employs 18 paid staff, 21 volunteer staff and technicians as well as provides meaningful jobs for over 100 volunteers at any one time. In the last 10 years they have diverted from landfill over 500,000 computers and peripheral devices. NextStep also: educates and empowers low income and disadvantaged Oregonians and others by providing refurbished computers that allow access to technology and the Internet; recycles computer hardware and other electronics in an environmentally sound manner, keeping hazardous waste out of Oregon's soil and water environments; provides skill-training opportunities to those who are considered unemployable, are currently underemployed, and/or are people new to the job market; and offers education to the general public regarding the importance of electronics and polystyrene foam recycling and the impact of these kinds of waste on our environment. b Environmental Protection Agency: Recycling is Working in the United States report, 2001 (EPA, 2001) Z:\CMO\2009 Council Agendas\M090209\S090209B.doc