After 20 years, the County lead Bridgenorth Organics pilot program has ended.
During the June 24 County Council meeting, Kerri Snoddy, Manager, Waste Management & Sustainability presented a report outlining the program results and offering alternative options.
Snoddy told council that the Waste Management Committee recommended they cancel the organics program in Bridgenorth in favour of implementing more equitable programs throughout the township.
Her report stated that since 2006, the Bridgenorth curbside organics pilot program has operated weekly.
However, only about 13 per cent of households ever participated in the program with 84 out of 623 households partaking. This equaled about 40 metric tonnes of organics being diverted every year.
The way the program worked was that Peterborough County provided green bins free of charge to households within the Bridgenorth area. Over the period of the pilot, they have been able to divert a total of 852 tonnes of organics and avoided emitting 322 tonnes of CO2 equivalent (tCO2e) emissions.
According to the report, the collection contract for this program expires on October 31, 2026.
Due to the contract ending, the county had two choices
• continue to promote this program and go out for procurement for a new contract, making the program permanent.
• end the program after a 20-year pilot period. Snoddy’s report stated that the purpose of a pilot program is to determine the feasibility to expand, however, the Country had already determined they would not be leading curbside collection of organics throughout all eight townships.Annually, the Bridgenorth Organics program diverted about 40 tonnes of waste at a cost of about $41,000 annually. This broke down to about $1025 per tonne to divert.Staff recommended county council end the organics program but implement alternative options that would be able to be more cost effective and equitable for all townships . The three alternative options include:
• Expand the Depot Drop Off Program
County Moloks are currently available to Residents within corresponding Townships such as Trent Lakes (4 units), Havelock Belmont Methuen (5 units), Doruo Dummer (5 units), North Kawartha (3 units), and Cavan Monoghan (2 units).
A Molok is a brand of semi-underground waste and recycling container.
With the 19 units, the County is able to divert about 141 tonnes of waste annually for $55,792 ($396 per tonne annually).
The plan would be to expand this offering into the three townships who currently do not have moloks at their landfills. The report recommended installing two Molok Units at the transfer stations in Otonabee-South Monaghan and Asphodel-Norwood, and four Molok units at the Smith landfill in Selwyn. Further expansion would then be considered once the drop off program is offered equitably in all townships.
• Expand the Backyard Composting Program
The County sells composters and digesters through the township offices and through their Garbage to Garden installation program.
Currently, they are able to divert about 234 tonnes of organic waste through this program at the cost of $2,500 or $11 per tonne annually.
Snoddy’s report recommended that to improve uptake in our backyard composting program, staff recommended a pilot program to offer backyard composter giveaways. Residents would sign up through an online form to receive a free backyard composter at pop up events throughout the County.
If successful and 500 additional backyard composters or digesters were awarded to residents, there would be an additional 75 tonnes diverted annually at the cost of $25,000.
• Offer a Counter-top Unit ProgramSnoddy said that several townships within the County have successfully implemented counter top programs where counter-top units have been sold at a subsidized rate to residents.
The staff recommendation for this option was a three year County program where counter-top units would be sold at a discounted rate of $50 per unit to boost participation and to keep the program accessible for a broad range of households.
The hope would be to sell 1500 units that could potentially divert 375 tonnes of waste at the cost of $300,000 ($100 per tonne over an eight year lifespan).
Snoddy said that these options are more cost effective per tonne than the current Bridgenorth curbside program and would be offered throughout the county, making it more equitable for residents in all townships. Her report said that organics make up over 50 per cent of Peterborough County’s residential waste, and reducing organics is crucial in extending landfill capacity and reducing our GHG emissions.
The funds for implanting these projects would come from the Waste Management & Sustainability reserve fund. Ending the Bridgenorth program would also reduce their annual budget by about $41,000, offsetting additional operating costs.
Warden Bonnie Clark thanked Snoddy for the presentation stating that 40 per cent of methane gas produced in County landfills comes from organic waste so implanting county initiatives to offset that would be great.
Coun. Heather Watson asked if the county had considered allowing County residents to use Molok units at different townships then where they reside.
She explained that even though Douro Dummer has Moloks at Hall’s Glen Depot, many residents do not feel it is worth the carbon emissions to drive from one end of the township to the other just to deposit organic waste when they could go to a boarding township much closer to them.
Snoddy responded by saying, “We receive resident inquiries all the time about that. The reasoning why residents have to use that specific depot is right now due to the provincial environmental compliance approvals at sites. So that would be something that we’d have to work with each Township on looking at amending those environmental compliance approvals and seeing if the province would be open to that. I think it is a worthwhile exercise, but it would be an administrative project that we would have to work with Township staff on, and there’s a cost associated with that as well.”
Many councilors echoed the statement that increasing Molok units for all townships would be a great initiative, however many also had concerns over the counter-top composter initiative.
It was stated by many councilors that while individual townships have had great success with counter top programs, it would not work well at a County level for several reasons.
Councilors stated that the cost per unit was too low, and would undercut the township programs. It was also mentioned that at a previous council meeting, council decided the county would not be involved with counter top programs except for perhaps during the procurement process to secure better pricing for townships.
A motion was made to end the Bridgenorth organics program while expanding both the Depot Drop Off Program and Backyard Composting Program.
The County would not move forward with the Counter-top composter program.
This motion was moved by Coun. Carol Armstrong and seconded by Deputy Warden Senis. It was carried.
