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A recycling plant that’s key to Toronto’s new garbage strategy has closed unexpectedly, throwing part of the city’s ambitious trash diversion plans into limbo.

The Canadian Polystyrene Recycling Association in Mississauga announced it was suspending operations just two weeks after Toronto began rolling out its mega blue bins.

The large-capacity blue boxes were purchased to accommodate the addition of polystyrene and plastic bags to the residential recycling program next fall. All Toronto homes will have one by spring.

The closing has also sent Peel Region and Hamilton, which already recycle these materials, scrambling to find alternatives. These plastics may end up being sent to landfills.

Foamed polystyrene, a plastic resin, is used for food containers and packaging electronic equipment.

While the total weight of polystyrene tossed out by GTA residents is small, the volume is huge. One kilogram of polystyrene packaging fills more than two household garbage bins. Hamilton collects about 3,000 kilograms a year.

The plant, the only recycler in the province big enough to take Toronto’s expected volume of polystyrene, had just invested $300,000 in state-of-the-art sorting equipment. But in a statement, the company cited declining revenues as the reason operations were halted.

“Our polystyrene market just went south,” said Steve Whitter, Toronto’s director of transfer, processing and disposal of solid waste. “Obviously it’s a setback.

“When Toronto gets into something like film plastic or polystyrene, they will very quickly swallow up all the available capacity that’s in the marketplace because we’re just so much bigger than everyone else.”

For now, the city intends to accept polystyrene and seek another market. “Normally, there’s a backup,” said Whitter. “Someone comes out of the woodwork who’s interested in taking the material if there’s a need, and there’s clearly a need.”

The closed plant has been recycling Peel’s polystyrene for years.

Its failure is “indicative of the whole issue” of plastics recycling, said Andy Pollack, Peel’s director of waste management. He said companies should only use plastic packaging if they can ensure markets are in place to recycle it. Last year, only 20 per cent of Ontario’s plastic packaging was recycled.

“Municipalities are at the end of the line. We have to manage what packagers and retailers decide to use so we’re constantly trying to figure out – out of all this plastic packaging – what is recyclable and what’s not,” he said. “It’s a big challenge for us.”

Cities can’t add items to the blue box mix that don’t have a market at the other end. “Someone out there has to say, `I’m a company that recycles plastic and I’m willing to take this type of plastic.’”

In two years, Michigan’s landfills will close to Ontario garbage, and all regions need to grapple now with ways to reduce, reuse and recycle. Forty to 50 per cent of all waste in the GTA, including organics, yard waste and recyclables, is diverted from landfills, but municipalities hope to increase that to 60 to 70 per cent in a few years.

Toronto has an ambitious diversion plan underpinned, ironically, by its purchase of a landfill near St. Thomas, Ont. – an investment that clarified for city officials how important it is to keep waste in check.

“If we simply continue to use (the St. Thomas landfill) at the current rate, it will fill up by 2024,” said solid-waste manager Geoff Rathbone. With the new diversion plan, the city can use the landfill it bought for $220 million for another 10 years, until 2034.

That’s why the city wanted to add high-volume polystyrene and bags to its program in the first place. “We’re given a certain number of million cubic metres to fill, and then it’s full,” Rathbone said.

The city is also introducing a pay-as-you-go plan that will force residents who put out bigger volumes of garbage to pay more. It plans to build two new processing centres for organics, six new reuse centres and a mixed-waste processing plant. The project, still in its infancy, would treat waste to reduce it before it goes to landfill.

Not everyone is ready to follow. Durham officials considered building a mixed-waste processing plant, but a tour of a Dutch operation convinced them otherwise.

“Think of breaking open bags of garbage and then spinning them around, trying to extract the odd bits and pieces that might be recyclable,” said works commissioner Clifford Curtis. “It’s almost an inhuman place to work. We went in and we might as well have thrown our clothes away when we got out. The smell got in everything.”

Curtis also has had doubts about adding plastic bags and foam to Durham’s blue box program.

“There are just some things that we can’t recycle because there is no market for it, such as plastic film and polystyrene foam,” he said. The bags are used to make plastic lumber, but “it’s a really, really thin market and it’s not stable,” he said.

The two items are also difficult to sort at the recycling plant. Foam breaks up easily and often clings to other material because of its static properties, while bags fly around and are difficult to pull manually from fast-moving conveyor belts.

Though Peel has been taking plastic bags for years, the region is starting a campaign to persuade residents not to put loose bags into the box. In plants with automated machinery, the bags get wrapped around anything that is spinning, so they’re a constant maintenance issue, said Pollack, who would like to see retailers collect bags instead.

Despite the challenges, Curtis thinks the next two years will be “a time of great opportunity.”

“People are finally grasping the concept that we can’t keep throwing our garbage into the ground and they are trying to divert to save resources. And people are willing to pay a premium to do that,” he said.

“They are trying to do the right thing. I think that’s very encouraging.”

RECYCLING ACROSS THE GTA: PLANS BY REGION

Peel Region

Has a 20-year contract with Algonquin Power in Brampton, the only residential waste incinerator in the province. The privately owned company incinerates half its garbage, with the remainder currently going to the Pine Tree Acres landfill in Michigan. Once that’s closed, the region’s garbage will go to Warwick Landfill near Sarnia, Ont. An environmental assessment approved the landfill’s expansion. Its use is still waiting on a certificate of approval, which should come in the next two years.

Halton Region

Hopes to reach 60 per cent diversion by 2010. Increased diversion rates will extend the life of the Milton landfill by seven years, until 2030.

In April, it will add a green cart program for food waste. Blue box collection will change from every two weeks to weekly. Garbage collection will change from weekly to every other week.

Durham Region

The region wants to build an energy-from-waste facility, similar to Algonquin Power in Brampton, which incinerates half of Peel’s garbage and creates electricity. The proposal, slated for a site in Clarington, Ont., near Oshawa, is undergoing environmental assessment. “It’s theoretically possible, if everything goes right, to be ready by 2010,” says Clifford Curtis, works commissioner in Durham Region.

York Region

The region is building a plant in Vaughan that will turn garbage into energy pellets, which Andy Campbell, York’s director of waste management, says look like dense goose droppings. The pellets can be burned in boilers, approved for use in Ontario greenhouses.

The region is also investing in Durham Region’s proposal for an energy-from-waste plant.

Written by Patti Winsa of the Toronto Star

When even a relatively successful operator has had it, you know Ontario agriculture is in big trouble

There’s something new growing in Bert Andrews’ field, in front of the patch of long-wilted rhubarb and the wispy, overgrown asparagus.

“For Sale/Lease, By Owner” reads the giant white sign, “Growing Farm Business, Winery and Farm Property. ”

After 27 seasons, Andrews’ Scenic Acre, on the outskirts of Milton, is going the way most farms in the area have gone – out of business.

Not because it hasn’t been profitable – this past season has been Andrews’ best to date. But he had open-heart surgery last year, and none of his children wants to take over the operation.

“I’m 64 years old – I want my Sundays off,” Andrews says on a warm fall afternoon, looking out at his fields and the russet-coloured Niagara Escarpment in the distance. The heads of his towering Russian sunflowers have long turned black and now curl downward. The last of his pumpkins have been sold. And the haystack, which visiting schoolchildren jumped on until last week, will soon be dismantled – perhaps for the last time.

It’s the end of an era, not just for Andrews, but also for agriculture in the Toronto area.This is the best farmland in the country. But we’re quickly paving it over. The Greater Toronto Area – including Durham, Halton, Peel and York regions – lost 16 per cent of its farms between 1996 and 2001. Since then, another five per cent have disappeared.

There’s a sign nailed beside the door of Andrews’ barn that reads: “Farmers Feed Cities.” It should say: “Cities Eat Farms.”

Up to 80 per cent of the produce we buy travels thousands of kilometres by truck or plane. Even apples – which are quintessentially Ontarian and can keep in cold storage for months – travel 5,900 kilometres on average to get to us, according to a recent Region of Waterloo Health study.

Contrary to what one might think given how much of our food is imported, Canadians spend less of their disposable income on nourishment – about 10 per cent on food and non-alcoholic beverages, according to the OECD – than residents of most other developed countries. A related fact: domestic farmers make less than half of what Toronto garbage collectors earn. (The average farm earns less than $25,000 a year before expenses, according to the latest census report.)

The profession’s self-esteem is in the gutter. As Andrews regularly points out, Ontario agriculture minister was once a plum posting. Now, it’s an afterthought, rarely noted in reports about cabinet shuffles, because it’s no longer considered a powerful portfolio, even though it’s the only ministry that touches all of us many times daily.

Faced with a future of long hours, little respect and less pay, is it surprising that young farmers are leaving the land in droves?

Despite the growing local food movement, most farmers and food policy wonks agree: the future of Ontario farming is bleak. Most predict it will take a horrific event like 9/11 to wake us up to the dangers of relying entirely on foreign food.

“I have a three-month-old granddaughter, and I don’t want her to be hungry in her lifetime,” says Mike Shook, program manager with FarmStart, a Guelph-area non-profit aiming to get more farmers on the land. “If we keep in the direction we are, I fear she will be.”

Many urge the government to take action before it’s too late. The Greenbelt – which protects 720,000 hectares of land circling Toronto from development– is a start, they say. But protecting land is one thing; ensuring that food grows on it is another. Horse farms are the second fastest-growing agricultural category in the Toronto area, after cash crops like winter wheat, according to the last census.

“We need a master plan,” says Andrews.

He remains among the small minority of optimists. How else would he have survived almost three decades of farming near Milton, the fastest growing municipality in the country, as subdivisions and golf ranges replaced the fields he once ploughed?

The ultimate proof: he hopes to sell his property to a farmer.

“There are people who think I don’t have a hope in hell,” he chuckles. “But I’ve been hearing that all my life.”

To an outsider, Andrews’ Scenic Acres seems one of the most successful farms around. The 39-hectare property bursts with blackberries, pumpkins, strawberries … as well as 17,000 bottles of fruit wine a year. Andrews runs a bustling market out of one of his barns and sends his produce out to eight farmers’ markets every week.

More than 15,000 school children tour his farm each summer. And far more than that come out, mostly on weekends, to pet his goats and ride a tractor out to the fields to pick their own food. One Sunday this fall, a record 3,300 people swarmed the farm to pick pumpkins. For many city slickers, such “entertainment farms” have become their only connection to rural life.

No matter how successful and cherished Andrews’ Scenic Acres may be, is it realistic to think a farmer will buy it when speculators are scooping up property all around Andrews? Nearby farmland inside the Greenbelt is going for $20,000 an acre – a price most farmers could never afford. Farms like his that fall outside the Greenbelt border are running at $50,000 an acre. Which means only a Rosedale stockbroker would have the necessary cash.

That’s exactly who Andrews is banking on – “It would have to be somebody who had passion.”

Wayne Roberts, project co-ordinator for the Toronto Food Policy Council, has a different buyer in mind: the Ontario government. “That’s obvious to anyone concerned with the future of food security in Ontario,” he says. Not only would the province save the most productive land from being stripped of its topsoil and converted to homes and malls, but it could also boost aspiring farmers into the business by renting out small acreages to them at affordable prices – he calls them “farm condominiums.”

“Once land is changed from agriculture into something else,” he says, “it’s almost impossible to reclaim. If this farm goes, it’s not late – it’s too late.”

By Catherine Porter, Environment Reporter for the Toronto Star

The following post is by Mike Cluett. Please visit Mike Cluett’s Milton blog site here:

The Region of Halton recently announced that it was going forward with a Green Cart Program to help reduce the amount of waste that heads to our landfill site. In case people are unaware of where that landfill site is, take a trip down 25 (Bronte Road) south of Derry and you will soon see it.

There was quite the discussion during the last municipal election on what should be done with the landfill, which is quickly approaching capacity. With the hundreds and hundreds of new homes being built in the area there will be a further demand on that landfill and it’s up to us as residents to do our part.

The Region of Halton currently has the Blue Box program in place. You are to put glass, plastics etc. in one box and in the other we place the acceptable paper products, boxes, etc. As of April 2008 it was announced that residents will be able to put all products into one box instead of separating it, given the improvement in the separation technology available.

During that campaign a debate raged on about the EFW (Energy From Waste) proposal that was put before Regional Council and the pros and cons involved. In essence, an incinerator would be built at the landfill and the waste would then be burned using clean technology to produce energy that would be used in the region of Halton and beyond. Coupled with this proposal, there was the much maligned Pristine Power Plant issue that seemed to dominate the last half of the campaign…

To continue reading this column, go to Mike Cluett’s Milton Blog.

The tiny town of Eden Mills outside of Milton wants to become the first carbon neutral community in North America

Idyllic Ontario town wants to become the first carbon neutral population centre in North America

About 10 kilometres past the village of Brookville on the northwestern outskirts of Milton, past modest Victorian houses now being challenged by monster homes, is Eden Mills, population 350.

Nestled demurely by the Eramosa River, Eden Mills is turning away from the kind of progress symbolized by monster homes. Instead, it is contemplating a different path: It wants to become the first carbon neutral community in North America.

Reaching zero net carbon dioxide emissions won’t be easy. Many residents travel a fair distance to work – to Guelph, Kitchener, Cambridge, Toronto. Most heat with oil or propane, have air conditioning, and use electric water heaters.

Arriving at a zero balance will call for reducing emissions, substituting renewable energy for energy based on fossil fuels, and removing CO2 from the air. It will mean living with a much smaller environmental footprint.

The idea of going carbon neutral was brought home to Eden Mills in June by Charles and Anna Simon, fresh from a visit to Ashton Hayes, which is aiming to be England’s first carbon neutral village. Ashton Hayes claims on its website (www.goingcarbonneutral.co.uk) to have reduced CO2 emissions by 20 per cent in its first year.

Once home from England, Charles and Anna invited people over to discuss the idea. Glenn and Libby Little were among those who came. They immediately embraced the idea.

It’s not as if environmental issues were new to the two couples. Charles is an architect who has designed environmentally advanced buildings; the Littles live in a straw bale house that Charles helped them design; they, in turn, are trying to persuade the district school board to erect straw bale classrooms that could substitute for some of the board’s 180 portables.

This environmental gang of four quickly became a core group of 15. Another dozen people now assist.

For their formal launch next month, they’ve created a project outline that establishes goals, and proclaims a determination to “change the way we behave and think about the products we use.” In other words, the outline says, “It’s about changing the way we live.”

Everything is so scattered, says Charles, that reducing the amount of driving will be a major problem. It’s necessary to go to a nearby town even for routine shopping. A bike path and car pooling can only help so far and a more comprehensive solution is needed.

For Eden Mills, it’s a shame that the Toronto Suburban Railway no longer exists. It was an electric railway.

“Really,” says Charles, “it was just a long streetcar line,” which ran from Keele and Dundas Sts. in Toronto to Guelph and passed about three kilometres south of Eden Mills. It was abandoned shortly before the Great Depression. Were it still operating, it would solve many of Eden Mills’ transportation problems.

The organizers will work with the University of Guelph to measure the environmental footprint of households in the village. They will record emissions attributable to heating and cooling, appliances, and transportation, and will repeat the survey every year for the first five years to measure progress at each household. The university will also help develop plans for planting trees to absorb CO2.

The group also intends to create a scientific advisory board to provide ongoing advice, launch educational initiatives, generate renewable energy, and reduce fuel consumption.

With global warming advancing, sleepwalking into the future is not an option, says Charles. “We’re not powerless. Together we can do things.”

Maybe they can inspire other communities to do the same.

Written by Cameron Smith