|Debra Smith|
Many people have recently expressed concerns that the transfer station is not recycling materials that residents carefully sort and place in the bins there. Some reported that they are now just putting all of their recyclables in with their trash (except for cans and cardboard) or driving their recycling to work with them, to Eco Maine single sort bins.
What’s the story with recycling in New Gloucester?
New Gloucester is an owner of Maine Waste to Energy in Auburn, along with several other towns. They incinerate trash, using a high tech system that reduces emissions and keeps waste out of landfills.
The market for most recycled materials has collapsed, according to Town Manager Christine Landes. We are still recycling cans and cardboard, but just about everything else goes to the MMWAC waste-to-energy plant.
Public Works Director Ted Shane wrote, in a memo to Landes:
We are still separating our recyclables into small bins that are later emptied into 40-yard roll off containers.
Metal cans are recycled for cash at $100.00 per ton.
Cardboard goes to Pinetree (Casella) in Lewiston, we get nothing in return for cardboard, it costs the town $95.00 per haul, each container holds approximately 2.3 tons and there is on average 54 hauls per year just for cardboard.
Paper, plastic and glass goes to MMWAC in Auburn, we get nothing in return for these materials, in fact we pay $41.00 per ton (increasing to $46 per ton in July), to get rid of these materials and these materials are burned and turned in to energy. These materials cost the Town $85.00 per haul to transport and currently there is approximately 50-55 hauls per year.
With all this said, one might ask, “Why do we separate the materials, why not throw everything in the compactor”? Because it would cause the compactor to fill up every day and cost more to transport, also an empty compactor wouldn’t last a full day on Saturday and could cause us to close down early.
When asked why residents haven’t been informed of this, Landes expressed concern that people might get out of the habit of recycling, and it would be hard to get them to start again. The select board has asked her to look into this issue over the next year.
Watch for a review of what other towns are doing in an upcoming post.
