The City of Toronto has instituted the Green Bin Program to collect organic waste and turns it into compost. The obvious goal of this program is to reduce the amount of garbage that goes into landfill sites.
Organic waste includes food leftovers, egg shells, coffee grounds/filters, tea bags, house plants including soil, pet’s waste, soiled paper towels and tissues, diapers and sanitary products, and certain paper food packaging. To people like us living in high-rise buildings, this could be somewhat challenging to implement. There are two approaches to deal with this.
The first approach is to have big green bins put at where currently the garbage is being picked up. Each unit will be given a small bucket to put their organic waste in. Once a day or once every 2 or 3 days, depending on the type and amount of organic waste collected, you will have to carry the bucket to the outside of the building to dump it in the green bins.
"That’s very inconvenient!" We hear you. So we have the second approach.
The second approach is to retrofit a bi-sorter into the current garbage chute. This is how it works: There are two buttons on each chute opening on each floor. You press one button for regular garbage, and press the other button for organic waste. Well, if you by mistake dump garbage into the organic waste chute, the entire organic waste will become contaminated and the City may treat it as regular garbage.
Sounds wonderful! What’s the catch? Obviously, it’s the $$$money$$$. The bi-sorter will cost us more than $40,000 to install, plus annual maintenance costs thereafter. Each unit in the 880 Grandview Way building, on the average, will have to shoulder a cost of close to $300.
So, the first approach appears to be the one that should be tried out first because the cost is minimal. If the first approach turns out to present major problems, then the second approach may then be the option.
So, when you take your bucket full of organic waste from your unit to the outside, please make sure the bucket won't drip; otherwise, carpet cleaning costs will soar drastically.
Update: The City of Toronto has provided, free of charge, small blue boxes for recycling. This small blue box can fit under the kitchen sink. You can pick up your blue box now at the Management Office (Tel: 416-229-4274).
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