Curbside Battery Recycling Pilot City of Guelph Curbside Battery Recycling Pilot

The Highlights Curbside battery collection with an automated cart collection system Where did we collect How did we collect the batteries Advertising What we got Costs Issues – Lessons Learned Do it again? We were the pioneers for the muni sector – the first cart collection program to pilot a curbside battery collection program. It seemed like Cory and I tossed around collection scenarios for months before landing on one that wouldn’t piss off too many people and get as many batteries off the street as possible. We weighed health & safety concerns, speed of collection and maximizing diversion. You lucky folks will have found a City of Guelph battery bag in your delegate package – feel free to use that for your own batteries or your next turbulent airline flight. These are the points I’m going to cover in my presentation today. 2

We collected from single family residential and multi-res We collected from single family residential and multi-res. My understanding is that we have about 45,000 hshds, yet in speaking to our Collections Manager last week, he felt it was closer to 52,000 – housing explosion in the last six months. Many multi-res properties did not place out batteries for collection – red flagged for us that we needed more specific outreach.

Combination of contracted collection and city staff How did we collect Asked residents to fill bag and place on ground beside their blue cart on their recycling collection day Combination of contracted collection and city staff We asked the residents to place the bag on the ground beside their blue cart on their recycling collection day. This decision turned out to work fairly well for the most part. For a variety of reasons, we had ruled out asking the collection drivers to pick up the batteries, with the biggest reason being to keep them to their timed collection schedules. We hired a contractor to collect the batteries, but ended up helping him by driving a portion of that day’s route. We drove around in a van and hand bombed the battery bags into 5-gallon pails.

Advertised: City News Webpage Media release Social media Guelph Tribune CNA/OCNA City facilities Mayor & Council Here’s a list of the suite of P&E tactics we used. We also developed a FAQ sheet for front line staff at SWR and other city facilities. In anticipation of some stressful days ahead - collecting the batteries, we asked Phil to help us prepare…

Here he is blowing up Mr. Bozo the Clown – our stress relief punching bag….

What did we get We got bags beside the blue cart, under the blue cart, on top of the blue cart. We also saw batteries placed beside the grey cart, set out on the wrong collection week, etc. One of our oversights was putting the “Week A” - “Week B” on the top of the bag. This was historical language that referred to their collection zone and which dates they set out their grey cart – it ended up being very confusing for residents.

We turned into Nancy Drew (sleuths for those youngsters in the crowd), looking for orphaned bags (when carts had been collected and residents had taken them in), looking for orange bags amongst the leaves, even finding bags on top of carts that had been wheeled back into driveways and open garages. Every day we were given a short list of missed addresses and collected those too – the high profile of the program prompted us to be attuned to providing a high level of customer service. Batteries continue to be delivered, in these bags, to our Waste Resource Innovation Centre and city facilities to this day.

Retired, safety conscious folks with a surfeit of duct tape in the junk drawer. We tried to debag at the curb where possible or if not at the end of each day. All the batteries were stored in drums in our MHSW facility until collection from RMC.

Costs Contractor Staff time Printing of bags Distribution of bags Advertising How many pounds of batteries did we collect? 6,267 lbs. We didn’t conduct a participation rate study for this first collection. There was no real net loss. The benefits of this program are immediate and desirable – keep the batteries out of the landfill.

Issues – Lessons Learned Get the bag instructions right Choose your distribution channel carefully Determine whether you need a contractor or DIY Get it right – think like a resident. Be creative about your bag distribution (think volunteers, special events, etc.). Can you do it on your own or do you need outside help.

Do it again? Just before I finish my presentation I would like to personally thank Cory Graper and RCM for all their support and encouragement before, during and after, running this pilot. They were with us every step of the way and we couldn’t have done it without them – thank you Cory. Not just a question of whether we would do it again but how we would do it again…what improvements would we make to save time and money. My Manager, Heather Connell has promised that I can run the collection again if I can keep it under $1,000. I’m soliciting for volunteers now for this fall’s collection. Any takers?