Don’t put the ax in your green bin

Don’t throw any more, the yard is full. Literally.

The Lachine sorting center is overflowing. So much so that the stacks of paper sometimes stand above the fire sprinklers, the bundles fill the yard and there were fears for a moment that the collection of 60% of Montreal’s green bins would have to be interrupted.

In short, it is the crisis. Still.

It is easy to conclude that our recycling system is broken and that we had better turn our green bin into a flower box. After all, we’ve all seen those reports showing that the containers that we take the trouble to rinse end up in the dump. Or, worse, circle the planet before being burned in India.

However, this view is too pessimistic. Because a good part of the problem comes from the company that operated the Lachine sorting centre: Ricova. And that the contents of our green bins can very well be recycled here instead of being sent elsewhere.

The proof: the majority of Quebec centers manage to sign long-term agreements with local recyclers. And if there are still problems in our recycling ecosystem, governments are coming — finally! – with solutions likely to improve it.

The City of Montreal announced last week that it was terminating its contract with Ricova at the Lachine sorting center. This decision is the right one.

Ricova may not have been responsible for all the problems that plagued these new installations. The company has always claimed not to have received sufficient budgets to carry out quality work there. She is also suing the equipment manufacturer Machinex, which allegedly did not provide her with the right equipment.

It is not easy to see clearly in these chicanes. But what is obvious is that Ricova was not part of the solution in Lachine.

In the spring, the Office of Inspector General (BIG) denounced the “deceitful” maneuvers of the company. According to the report, Ricova essentially sells its materials to itself at low prices in order to reduce the profits it shares with the City of Montreal.

In addition, the company sticks to its export model, which consists of roughly sorting the materials received and exporting them rather than selling them on the local market. However, experts and people in the industry are formal: contrary to what it claims, Ricova could sell a good part of its materials on the Quebec or North American market.

“If it is well sorted, it is possible”, slice in particular Marc Olivier, professor-researcher at the Center for Technological Transfer in Industrial Ecology.

The Via organization will now take over from Ricova in Lachine. We can hope that he will do things differently.

Among other reasons for hope, note that the expansion of the deposit should remove within a year a large number of beverage containers from bins, whether glass, plastic or metal. In Pointe-Saint-Charles, the Owens-Illinois glassworks is investing 70 million to be able to process the glass that will reach it in this way.

In Montreal, starting next week, plastic bags will be banned in shops and restaurants. Difficult to recycle, they contaminate other materials and are a scourge. Next year, single-use plastics will be banned. The famous Publisac, which represents 11% of the volume sent to sorting centers (it’s huge!), will only be distributed to those who signal their desire to receive it with a sticker.

More fundamentally, extended producer responsibility, which will apply gradually until 2025, will ensure that companies will themselves be responsible for recycling the packaging they put on the market.

These changes are coming late, but they are coming. We must denounce the failures that strike selective collection, but this is not the time to throw everything in the trash.