Kevin Anderson
editor@lapressecommunautaire.ca
KAPUSKASING – In a report to Kapuskasing council on Wednesday night, General Manager of Public Works, Éric Côté said that the municipality’s recycling program is breeding “healthy” results.
In 2017 the Kapuskasing Moonbeam Landfill Site Recycled a total of 563.35 tonnes of material with 467.90 tonnes of that total coming from the Kapuskasing Area.
The diversion factor for 2017 was approximately six per cent. In 2018 the Kapuskasing Moonbeam Landfill Site Recycled a total of 613.84 tonnes of material with 513.13 tonnes of that total coming from the Kapuskasing Area. The diversion factor for 2018 was approximately eight per cent.
“What we’re seeing is a positive upward trend in the growth of the program,” said Côté. “Right now, we’re shipping four 15-tonne trucks of recycling every three weeks. We’re recycling quite a bit as a municipality and it’s increasing.”
Kapuskasing mayor David Plourde said he was pleased with the growth of the program not only for environmental reasons, but also for financial ones.
“Recycling is important, but most importantly in my mind is that it’s adding to the life expectancy of the landfill site,” said Kapuskasing mayor David Plourde. “Starting up a new landfill site is quite costly, so any time we can add to using the existing one saves money and lessens the burden on taxpayers.”
During the meeting the question was posed as to whether or not Kapuskasing would follow the lead of other municipalities, which have removed plastic bags and containers from their programs.
“Even though there really isn’t a market for it at this point, the company that is responsible for our recycling says they will continue to accept the material,” said Côté. “Additionally, we feel at this time that after all of the effort we’ve put into educating people about the program, that it would be confusing to change it at this point.”
