Last year, 750,100 tonnes of Toronto’s garbage found a new home in Michigan landfills. Professor Pierre Belanger of the faculty of architecture, landscape and design has visited these sites every month for the past two years. Belanger aims to shed light on the network of garbage in Canada, and understand the root of Toronto’s trash woes.
Belanger said the key to reducing garbage is separating at the source-dividing materials and recycling them. He believes that urban density complicates the problem of recycling, and proposes changing the “mid-century 1950’s model” of centralized garbage collection; materials should be treated as close as possible to the source of garbage. This localized attitude toward waste management would avoid transportation and its associated environmental pollution. Organic material such as kitchen waste can be composted on site. Recycling parks should be set up in downtown Toronto so people can deposit recyclables themselves. A sophisticated example is Halton Region Landfill, a rural dropoff site for materials. The location is so popular that the Salvation Army has set up an area for donations.
The problem is a lack of motivation-we don’t see the cost of trash.
“It’s free to waste in North America, in Canada,” said Belanger. “But we’re ready to establish an urban ecology of waste products throughout the city. It’s a matter of policy. It would be easier to do it through tax incentives, for individual consumers and for entrepreneurs to develop industries out of these waste materials.”
Media coverage has highlighted Michigan residents’ resentment of incoming garbage, but Belanger spoke to some residents who actually welcome trash-because they see direct economic benefits.
Trash is a lucrative industry. The stock for the waste management firm Republic Services, whose biggest shareholder is Bill Gates, has risen 45 per cent in value since 2000. Last year, Michigan’s tax revenue from landfills constituted US$4 million, about 17 per cent of its total tax revenues. Tax dollars levied on each tonne of trash are used to fund roads, town halls, and fire and police services. At the Carleton Farms and Pine Tree Acres dumps, Belanger found no environmental concerns relating to personal health, however he did note the offensive odours, especially that of sludge, from human waste.
According to Belanger, the main issue is not about shipping Canadian garbage to Michigan. It’s about changing the way we see garbage and avoiding the need for landfills.
“We produce a secondary resource we call waste, but they are in fact a series of materials,” he said, “Large amounts of waste materials are creating new economies and industries-understanding this is essential to trimming down and avoiding waste.”
Belanger’s study of Michigan landfills forms a chapter in the anthology Trash, whose launch kicked off the month-long Festival of Trash. Organizer Alphabet City is inviting Torontonians to weigh in on what to do with our garbage. The Garbage Town Hall will take place at the MaRS centre from 2 to 4 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 21, and will be moderated by Rotman School of Management’s Net Impact Club. The live proceedings will be transmitted through an on-site blog by Reading Toronto, at www.readingt.readingcities.com.
