Choose biodegradable bags for your green bin

The Toronto Environmental Alliance (TEA) says Toronto should require residents to use biodegradable bags instead of plastic in their green bins, which would eliminate the city’s need to separate waste and plastic mechanically, saving money and reducing the amount of plastic sent to landfills.

The director of collection services for the City of Toronto says Toronto’s green bin waste is mixed with water in a machine that separates waste from plastic. The waste is then sent to storage tanks, where it decomposes into compost over several months, and the plastic is sent to city landfills. Approximately 20 out of every 100 tonnes of organic waste collected through Toronto’s green bin program are plastic.

To further complicate things, Toronto has only one processing plant capable of separating plastic from organic waste, and only 25% of the city’s organic waste is processed within city limits. Most of the remaining waste is shipped to Quebec. Not so environmentally friendly, right? The city plans to reduce the number of trucks hauling waste to Quebec by building more organic-waste processing plants over the next several years.

Franz Hartmann, executive director of the TEA, says Toronto should simply require the use of biodegradable bags in green bins instead of purchasing more costly hydropulpers to remove plastic, a restriction already employed in Durham and Peel regions. “Not only are you reducing the potential contamination of the organics by the plastic, you’re also taking away another reason for people to use plastics in their daily lives,” Hartmann says. “Toronto could certainly learn from what’s happening in other jurisdictions, there’s no doubt about that.”

BioBag makes 100% biodegradable and compostable bags made from corn, available in Toronto at health and grocery stores such as Grassroots and Whole Foods.

source