Early results from changes in the city of Santa Fe鈥檚 recycling efforts indicate that in the weeks and months ahead, some fiddling with the program could be necessary.
In the three weeks after Santa Fe stopped the residential pickup of glass to be recycled, 20 fewer tons of glass from the city were taken in at the Buckman Road Recycling & Transfer Station. As Santa Fe Solid 黑料网 Management Agency Executive Director Randall Kippenbrock said, it鈥檚 too early to draw conclusions from those numbers. However, it is hardly too early to suspect that a lack of residential glass pickup is the culprit. Figures show that 63.3 tons of glass from the city were collected at the Buckman recycling center from March 13 to last Thursday, as compared to 83.5 tons from Feb. 20 to March 12.
With the advent of the city鈥檚 single-stream recycling 鈥� one convenient bin for plastics, paper and tin 鈥� glass could no longer be picked up at curbside, city waste managers decided. Their reasons make sense. There鈥檚 not a market to sell glass close enough to Santa Fe to make transportation worthwhile. The heavy glass also breaks machines and would weigh down the bins. So, city officials decided it would be less expensive and troublesome to stop picking up glass.
Yet, other expenses need to be figured in, such as the cost of hauling more waste to the Caja del Rio Landfill as residents add their glass to the trash load. The city and Santa Fe County pay by the ton of dumped waste to fund the landfill. Glass is one of the heavier materials in the waste stream, so the city鈥檚 dumping costs could rise quickly. The key will be determining whether the city鈥檚 higher landfill costs surpass the savings from increased recycling of other goods.
If current trends continue, more than 300 fewer tons of glass could be recycled in a year. (City and county residents and businesses generally produce some 150,000 tons of landfill waste a year.)
That doesn鈥檛 have to happen. Currently, city residents can take their glass bottles and jars to four drop-off locations for recycling. From there, the glass is moved to the recycling center. This needs to become one more stop for city residents, a gesture to improving our world and helping the city cut waste costs. It鈥檚 too soon to know whether the glass recycling drop-off sites will draw enough city residents to avoid weighing down the landfill, however. New habits and routines must be set.
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