On October 24th, the Zero Waste Task Force and Sierra club volunteers were able to tour Eureka Recycling in Minneapolis! Eureka Recycling is the only organization in Minnesota that specializes in Zero Waste; its mission is to demonstrate that waste is preventable, not inevitable.
We started with a tour of the Materials Recovery Facility, which sorts and processes over 350 tons of recycling every day. Complex machines (and lots of hardworking people!) turn giant piles of different materials all mixed together into 13 different types of materials ready to be shipped out and made into new products.
We then heard from one of the Co-Presidents and the Director of Community Engagement, who walked us through some of their recent policy work and described the difficulties of their work. We talked about what items make Eureka’s work challenging- items that are either harmful to equipment, dangerous for workers, or just waste time and energy to sort out. There are all kinds of easy things that we can all do to support Eureka, recycling in general, and subsequently, our environment. Simple things that we discussed today included:
1) Keeping plastic bags OUT of your home recycling bin. Bags should be recycled at a local drop site (grocery stores often have them).
2) Lithium Ion batteries, propane tanks, and black plastic CANNOT be recycled in your home (black plastic is always garbage). Eureka's website has in-depth “yes/no” lists of items that can and cannot be recycled. They also have an app (called “Eureka Recycling”) on which you can type in the name of an item and it will tell you how to properly dispose of it. Check it out!
3) Some items, such as needles, can be recycled, but not in your home. They need to be recycled at Hazardous Waste Centers.
4) Aluminum and glass can be recycled again and again. Plastic can typically only be recycled once, and is detrimental to the environment for many reasons. Reduce your plastic use (including water bottles, bags, straws, etc)!
The sheer volume of STUFF was overwhelming: 2% of mass brought in to Eureka is identified as garbage and then must be sent off to the incinerator; this percentage is quite low relative to other recycling sites in the country (it can often be as high as 20-30%). However, 2% of the 350 tons of daily recycling is still 14,000 pounds of garbage every day that has been improperly recycled. These statistics and the mountain of un-recyclables at the end of the line was difficult for me to see. This leads us to the most important change to strive for:
5) Think about your own consumption and purchasing habits and REDUCE! Buying, using and having less stuff is just easier and better. As Lynn who led the tour, stated, “we cannot recycle our way out of consumption”.
6) Watch "The Story of a Cereal Box"!
With major recent funding changes, Eureka needs support with their advocacy and policy work. We are hopeful to collaborate to support their good work in our community - stay tuned.
And please consider joining our Zero Waste Task Force on November 13th at 7 pm to discuss Zero Waste issues and to hear from guest speaker Paul Gartner at WasteZero - Meeting Details Here!