In October, Waste Management informed the city that our green cart contamination rate exceeded the 10 percent limit (by weight) specified in our current contract. WM informed the City it had conducted 17 separate audits of Newton’s recyclables at its recycling facility from January through Oct. 4, 2017, which showed a contamination rate of 18 percent.
The city is now being charged an extra monthly fee. From November through January, the extra charges amount to $21,740.74. Major contaminants of recycling carts continue to be plastic bags and film, food and beverage contamination and textiles (clothing).”
Several public/institutional restaurants have posted visual/verbal explanations of what falls into different categories of waste. Do they do better than Newton? Some of Newton’s categories still seem vague and unclear. For example what does the contamination of “film” refer to? photographs?
Unexposed film? Some type of wrapping material? How much is textiles/clothing? A detailed response from the Environmental Director of DPW would seem in order.
I think a modest public education campaign would help. I recycle carelessly, and only recently learned that this actually costs the city money. I bet if an effort were made to explain what the problem is, how much it’s costing us, and how easy it would be to fix, we could address this. (I thought plastic bags were OK to toss in my green bin. Turns out that’s wrong.)
Jonathan:
The city puts out a useful guide which I taped above my recycle bin in my kitchen. But I bet if the city identified a top 10 do not recycle list or do/don’t list. If they create that, I bet this post would be a good place to show it…
I agree about the education. Plus, different municipalities have different recycling guidelines, so it would be good for them to do regular ad campaigns about recycling best practices for new residents. I got that magnet years ago, but nothing since. Reinforcement on social media and email marketing could help, too.
The Star Market at the Lower Chestnut Hill Mall sells bluish plastic bags as recycling bags. Maybe the city could flag to them that these aren’t allowed in Newton (we also thought they were acceptable until we got a notice on our trash can after someone went through it) (an audit?).
http://www.newtonma.gov/gov/dpw/recycling/recycle_at_the_curb/default.asp
The City did mail out a detailed educational flyer about a year ago and clearly we need to do much more. We do have very good information on our website about what can go in the green recycling carts and what cannot. I urge people to take review it.
Plastic bags (or any kind of plastic film) can NEVER go in the green recycling cart. They jam the sorting equipment at the municipal recycling facilities. Please bring them back to participating stores for recycling. You can also bring plastic film (nothing to do with photography Brian) including plastic wrap, plastic packaging, bread bags and the like. Better yet, bring your re-usable bags when you go to the supermarket, the pharmacy, the bakery – anyplace where you get offered a bag.
@Claire, the Star Market is giving away plastic bags that are thick enough to meet Newton’s ordinance requirements and calling them re-usable bags. Is that what you are referring to? There is a bill at the Statehouse proposing a statewide plastic bag ban that would prohibit the type of bags the Star Market (and CVS) are giving out for free. I have been told it has a very good chance of passing this legislative session.
This link includes the complete list of what NOT to put into the green carts (as well at what you can recycle curbside):
http://www.newtonma.gov/gov/dpw/recycling/recycle_at_the_curb/default.asp
Please put all recycling loose in the green cart. Do not put them in a plastic bag. Please do not put any garbage, food waste, liquids, cooking oils, pet waste or Styrofoam in the green cart.
Thank you for helping the City save money and resources!
@Alison Leary – the problem is that people don’t go on the website. Especially not if they lead busy lives, as so many do. Our neighbors recycle their stuff in garbage bags… I hinted that there is a list but I don’t think that people take the time to look it up.
I really think that another flyer, one that mentions that we pay a fine now. Something SHORT like:
Did you know that Newton was fined over $21,000, with more fines to come?
Our city’s recycling has a contamination rate of 18% because people add plastic bags, film, plastics who are not free of food and oily liquids, as well as textiles and other items that do not belong there (all these words need to be bold or a different color). This is money that will not (in italics) be spent on schools, seniors or our infrastructure.
And then list what CAN be recycled at the bottom or the backside of the flyer.
@Alison Leary – I think the bags to which Claire is referring might be these:
https://www.target.com/p/glad-blue-recycling-tall-kitchen-drawstring-trash-bags-13-gallon-45ct/-/A-14736265
I have seen educational ads in both the Globe and the Tab about keeping plastic bags out of the green bins, and think I recall seeing a flyer included in either a tax or a water bill, but it does seem like more needs to be done. I wonder if Facebook ads are worth considering, or (likely much more expensive and logistically challenging) bright stickers applied to the green bins?
Boston has all-weather stickers describing acceptable recycling items *on their recycling bins.* (Actually, I think the Boston ones only have what you can recycle, but we could add information about what not to recycle.)
They aren’t a perfect answer. But they don’t get lost, they last for at least several years, and they don’t become recycling in and of themselves like mailers and flyers.
Many successful education programs tie the education message to the activity being educated about.
Would the contamination problem be eliminated if Newton separated paper and cardboard from its single-stream recycling?
I remember in 2008 when we were discussing moving to single stream, people were concerned about contamination damaging paper and cardboard in single-stream recycling and being told that there would be cameras on the recycling trucks that would catch badly recycled bins and not pick them up.
Green Newton funded all-weather stickers to put on recycling bins and then organized volunteers to go neighborhood to neighborhood sticking them on the bins (2010?). Perhaps instead of stickers, info should just be on the bins permanently, so when people move to Newton or replace their bins the information is there.
I think there is a lot of confusion around plastic bags and jars, bottle, etc. that contained food. I recall being told we didn’t need to rinse them out before adding them to single stream recycling. But then how do they not contaminate the paper and cardboard?
After sorting a few plastic bags out from our neighbors, I went our last night and wrote “No Plastic Bags” with a paint pen on the recycle bins for our four-unit home. I’d done similarly a year ago when the “Recycling Only” lettering had worn off.
If I’m charitable, I could say that – if the lettering is worn off – it’s very hard to distinguish between the blue and green bins in low light. The Green Newton stickers were an excellent guide, but most are significantly worn off now. Perhaps it’s time for another round?
Allison Sharma, I think a Facebook ad campaign is a good idea! They should consider it strongly. A lot of people will see it.
Thanks for posting Lucia- A good reminder for all of us to be more careful.
Help me understand this. Plastic bags (film — what’s the difference?) is probably one of the most severe contamination issues in terms of processing the recycling. However, they’re using weight as a metric. It would take an awful lot of plastic bags (or food/oil) for that to show up? The penalty we’re paying must be for other things people are tossing in the bins… textiles?
The plastic bags jam the recycling sorting machines.
@Lucia, but how many plastic bags would it take to show up as 10% by weight?
They might consider the entire weight of the bin contaminated if plastic bags are mixed in. This would be a question for someone on the Solid Waste Commission.
It would be interesting to understand what specifically is contaminating the bins. Does WM provide some kind of breakdown/analysis of the specific items that are leading to this volume of contaminated bins? I wonder if there are particular items that seem to be more prevalent in causing this classification.
An education option might be to coordinate with the elementary schools and educate our youngest citizens and get them to go home and educate their parents. Tie it into a social action effort.
On a side note the city site indicates that shredded paper can be recycled if it is in “a clear plastic bag or a stapled paper bag”… I thought no plastic bags were allowed? If they are allowed it would probably, make sense to include what the specifications are for the plastic bags to be used for this purpose.
Please do not use those Glad Recycling Tall Kitchen Drawstring Trash Bags. This is only if you want to throw out all your recycling in the blue bin, which seems to be the intent as they are called trash bags. If you throw a plastic bag of recycling in the green cart, the entire cart immediately becomes trash.
“Film” is any thin plastic material used to wrap leftovers ( polyethylene food wrap.) and used in almost all packaging.
We absolutely need to do more education and outreach and do it more consistently. The Solid Waste Commission meets regularly on the 3rd Thursday of the month at 6:45pm. All are invited to attend.
I want to mention the Recycle Right Newton app and the handy search tool which allows you to quickly find answers to your recycling and trash questions.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.recollect.newton&hl=en
Thanks for all the information Alison. Could you explain the shredded paper in plastic bags on the city website. Is it an error?
@Marti & Newton Highland’s Mom, regarding the shredded paper, that is outdated information that was once true. I will make sure that is updated on the website. Shredded paper has to go in a paper bag or it’s not recycled. I am asking for more info from WM regarding their contamination claims. This has never been an issue before and we have had contracts with them for over 30 years. We have 2 1/2 years left on the current contract and we are already thinking about what our needs will be.
Education in our schools is really important but it is mostly volunteer driven. We need more staff in order to get more done. We have an excellent solid waste and recycling manager, but it is just her and one other part time assistant. For a city of our size that just isn’t enough. I am advocating for at least one other F/T staff in the budget. We also need to update city ordinances to reflect best practices.