Council is looking to spread awareness about the importance of recycling properly after a recent general waste audit revealed that 80 per cent of recycling products are found in garbage collections. Peace River’s recycling program, otherwise known as the blue bag program, is available for every resident. It asks for people to put their recyclables out in a blue bags with cardboard underneath each week for pick up and there is no limit to how much can be put out.
Where the problem comes in is the lack of knowledge of what can be put in recycling versus garbage. The black bins that residents have in each household that holds up to 64 gallons of materials seems to be where people put the recycling they don’t know what to do with. Councillor Colin Needham says the town’s goal is to help residents realize “that if you do more recycling there are benefits from an environmental view but also locally.” By recycling properly, we use less air space at the landfill and reduce the overall cost of taking unnecessary materials to the landfill.
Peace River in comparison to other municipalities is not as strict. Some cities have bylaws that prohibits people from recycling incorrectly by penalizing them with a fine. This is not something the town is interested in considering because it requires them to adjust tax rates.
Needham hopes that with the messages they hope to spread in the fall, people will work towards practicing better recycling habits. He hopes that people will try to make use of the blue bag program. He reminds us that newsprint, cardboard and your plastics will be taken, but glass needs to be disposed of separately. He adds that the program does work in successfully taking recycling products out of the general household stream but that’s only possible when people dispose of their waste correctly. In order to get the full benefits of the blue bag program, you can find a list that outlines what is and is not recyclable on the Peace River Waste Management Company website.
LG
