Increased tonnage headed to the dump and lack of movement on waste-reduction legislation have led the Regional District of Nanaimo to revamp its solid waste services plan.
The RDN board approved a solid waste services financial and asset management plan at its Oct. 24 meeting. A plan was approved in 2020, but as the B.C. government has yet to green-light the RDN’swaste hauler licensing bylaw, and with 82,000 tonnes of garbage anticipated in 2023, up from 60,000-plus tonnes in 2019, a refresh was needed, noted a staff report. The province approved a related RDN mandatory waste source separation bylaw last spring, which would work in conjunction with the waste hauler licensing.
Due to the increased garbage the past two years, “the lifespan of the regional landfill has been reduced by approximately 2.8 years,” the report stated.
The RDN still aspires to divert 90 per cent of waste from the Cedar landfill by 2029, and the revised plan “includes an increased ability to inform the data sets based on real-world factors such as inflation, waste volumes received, and the achieved landfill compaction rate,” the report noted.
At the Oct. 12 select committee meeting, Ben Routledge, RDN manager of solid waste services, said the goal is to compact as much waste into one cubic metre as possible, with the standard for yards the size of the Cedar landfill 0.7 tonnes per cubic metre, with an ideal ratio of 1:1.
A GPS system has been installed, allowing the RDN to “accurately compact waste into the landfill,” Routledge stated at the meeting. In addition, a waste shredder is being tested, which could allow 30 to 35 per cent more “compaction density,” according to the report, adding life to the landfill. Prior to that, the RDN was achieving 0.89 tonnes per cubic metre, and with a compactor, it is 0.93 tonnes.
“With a shredder, we potentially get to 1.3 tonnes per cubic metre … so we move from 2042 up to about 2049, 2053, somewhere in that range,” said Routledge. “Either way, without higher diversion achieved, we’re not going to go beyond that.”
Ben Geselbracht, select committee chairperson, told the News Bulletin that the RDN is mandated to do a new plan every 10 years, and has “bent over backwards” to make the bylaws work. If approval isn’t given to the hauler licensing bylaw, it will be a major setback, he said.
“We’d be very upset, just given the amount of delay that there’s been,” said Geselbracht. “But we’ll have to change our strategy. Unless the province changes the way that it manages waste, we’ve topped out on what we can divert … I think that just adds to the frustration is that we’re actively putting solutions on the table, and they’re not being taken up in a timely manner for us to carry forward.”
The plan has measures to ensure operations and capital expenditures are fully funded without the need to borrow money, the report stated.
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