Building the Infrastructure Beyond Recycling GRRN National Zero Waste Action Conference Saturday, July 30, Ruth C. Abbe National Practice Leader HDR Engineering, Inc.

Agenda Barriers to Zero Waste –“Legacy Discards” –“Design for the Dump” –“Mistakes” Zero Waste Infrastructure –Physical Infrastructure –Social Infrastructure Culture Change –Alameda Technical Assistance –Stopwaste.org –San Francisco 2

Barriers to Zero Waste “Legacy Discards” “Design for the Dump” “Mistakes” 3 Disposable Espresso Capsules Targeted for Redesign

Barriers to Zero Waste 4 Legacy Discards Design for the Dump Legacy Discards Design for the Dump Mistakes

Zero Waste Infrastructure Physical infrastructure Universal access to recycling and composting collection services –Residential –Commercial –Institutional Processing capacity –Recycling –Full spectrum organics Self-haul –Resource recovery park – Facility Use Fee (San Luis Obispo) –Scavenging prior to landfilling – Urban Ore style (Berkeley) 5

Recyclables Processing Facility Tons per day Cost per tonPays $10-30 Acres required5-10 Phoenix North Transfer Station and Material Recovery Facility Curbside Processing

Composting - Large Scale and Small Scale Lamont Composting Facility, Kern County Tons per day100-1,000 Cost per ton$35-60 Acres required15-60 Griffith Park Composting Facility Windrow In-Vessel Aerated Static Pile

Resource Recovery Center Tons per day1-10 Cost per ton$ Acres required2 Monterey Regional Waste Management District

Construction and Demolition (C&D) Facility Downtown Diversion C&D Facility, Los Angeles Tons per day Cost per ton$30-40 Acres required10 C&D Processing

Anaerobic Digestion Tons per day Cost per ton$ Acres required5-10 Dranco, Brecht, Belgium Valorga Process, Barcelona, Spain Products/By-Products Biogas for energy Digestate for compost

Addressing “Mistakes”

Mixed Material Processing Tons per day Cost per ton$40-60 Acres required5-7 Rainbow Disposal, Huntington Beach Mixed Material Processing Products/By-Products Recyclables Compostables

Conceptual Design for San Francisco Zero Waste Facility 13

Facility Costs Per Ton FacilityCost per ton (net) Recyclables processingPays $10-30 Composting$35-60 Resource recovery park$ C&D processing$30-40 Anaerobic digestion$ Mixed materials processing$40-60 Local landfill$35-50 Remote landfill$80+

Zero Waste Infrastructure Social Infrastructure Alignment of Goals –Local Government –Generators –Service Providers Rate Structure Signals Community-Based Approaches New Rules and Mandates Culture Change Technical Assistance 15 Miss Alameda Says “Compost!”

Community Based Approaches Community Action for a Sustainable Alameda Local Action Plan for Climate Protection Zero Waste Implementation Plan Alameda Green Schools Challenge – comprehensive recycling and composting at all schools (public, private, parochial) Miss Alameda Says “Compost!” – targeting restaurant food scraps Faith-Based Outreach Program – greening faith-based organizations (churches, temples, mosques) and their congregations 16

Commercial Technical Assistance Stopwaste.org Metrics Stopwaste Partnership $270,000 per year –Targets large businesses (50+ employees or 15+ cubic yards per week of service) –800 active clients (30% of countywide total) –50 new clients per year –150 clients served per year –Goal is to divert 10,000 tons per year –New diversion costs less than $30 per ton for technical assistance Restaurant technical assistance $60,000 per year –Diverting 500 tons per month or 6,000 tons per year –New diversion costs about $10 per ton for technical assistance 17

Commercial Technical Assistance (cont.) 18 San Francisco Metrics Technical assistance contract for $330,000 per year New diversion from 60 to 80 businesses per month Goal is to divert 44,000 new tons per year New diversion costs less than $20 per ton for technical assistance