(204) 687-6169
Flin Flon & District Environment Council, Inc.
  • Home
  • Recycling
  • Landfill
  • News
  • About Us

Plastic Bags

11/3/2015

0 Comments

 
Originally published  Mar 4/15  The Reminder. Flin Flon, Mb. Sponsored by North of 53 Consumers Coop.

I am uncomfortable about the incredible number of plastic bags sent to the landfill from the Recycling Centre.

Some plastic bags are here because people don’t know we do not recycle them.

We do not collect plastic bags for recycling because we have no place to send most of them. Only a few kinds could be sent and the most common bags including grocery bags are not included.

The real conundrum for me is that we are responsible for most of the bags sent to the landfill.

I looked up the word conundrum. It is a difficult problem that cannot really be solved.

Here is the conundrum. Our facility does not have ground level access. We cannot drive into our building to remove loose recyclables for processing.

Other centres have trucks that dump it on the floor. It is moved with a machine to a sort line. The Pas pulls trailers into their building and removes the large containers of recyclables from the trailer with a forklift.

Our building has a loading dock on the front. Creating access at the back of the building would require a considerable amount of blasting very close to the building. Our lot is too narrow to create access at the side. All of this would have a high cost.

So for now, everything arrives contained in something. Most often a plastic bag is used, although boxes are fine.

The only exception is the blue bins at the Centre where people can place loose recyclables.  The bags in these bins are reused as many times as possible.

I rationalize this conundrum by reminding myself that each bag we throw away means  much more has been kept from the landfill. 

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    Author
    Deb Odegaard has been with the Flin Flon Community Recycling program since it began  in 1992.  She  became the Administrator in 2013.
    Deb writes a  column 'The Recycling Bin' in The Reminder, Flin Flon's newspaper. Past columns are posted here along with recycling stats  and anything else on her mind. 

    Categories

    All
    Brief History
    Events
    Recycling Bin 2020
    Recycling Bin 2021
    Recycling Statistics
    The Recycling Bin 2014
    The Recycling Bin 2015
    The Recycling Bin 2016
    The Recycling Bin 2017
    The Recycling Bin 2018
    The Recycling Bin 2019
    The Recycling Bin 2023

    Archives

    March 2023
    January 2023
    November 2022
    October 2022
    August 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    April 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014

    RSS Feed

​Flin Flon & District Environment Council, Inc