Styrofoam ban in Toronto?

Communities do their best to pick up after the Throw-Away Society. This is a thankless task that costs local residents and businesses in North America tens of billions of dollars each year and engenders more complaints than kudos.

But when a city goes to the trouble to recycle a product only to find there's no market for the collected materials ~ what's the solution? Check out this interesting article by Adria Vasil in Toronto NOW magazine:

"The new year did not commence well for Canadian recycling, especially right here in Toronto. In late December, 10 months before the city was poised to start adding polystyrene, aka styrofoam, as well as plastic bags to its blue bins, Canada’s only dedicated styrofoam recycler sent out a closure notice, effective immediately...." (pic: NOW)

CONTEST: how big is a pound of styrofoam?

You could be the lucky winner if you guess the correct answer to this question. Here are some clues:

"Styrofoam" (Expanded Polystyrene/EPS) is:

• 98% air




• 1/10th as dense as water (density ranges from 1.0 to 4.0 pcf)

While you work out the math, have a look at this great video of a styrofoam recycling machine!

How much styrofoam did Santa bring you this year?

If your post-holiday garbage is packed solid with "styrofoam" (aka expanded polystyrene, or EPS), you'll be encouraged by the following notes that crossed my desk today.

The Wisconsin State Journal ran a story about a retailer who figured 80% of his waste was styrofoam. He purchased a simple machine that cuts the big blocks of foam into chips that can be reused as loose-fill styrofoam "peanuts."

In September, New Scientist published a story about a patent application from some Chinese scientists who have developed a new way of making styrofoam so it melts away in water when you're done with it.

Will these be the breakthroughs that solve our styrofoam problem? Probably not. Solutions have come and gone for years.

The fact is, the companies that use styrofoam packaging are not looking for a breakthrough ~ because THEY don't have a problem.

From the electronic manufacturers' point of view, that styrofoam is a solution, not a problem ~ it protects their products from breakage during shipment.

It's only after the products are sold to the consumer that styrofoam morphs into a problem, filling your garbage can and your community's landfill.

And the electronics companies are not likely to give you any help dealing with your styrofoam ~ unless they have to. Which is what "Extended Producer Responsibility" is all about.

This is the new paradigm: if you sell a product, you're responsible for recycling it, cradle-to-cradle. That includes both the product and the packaging.

Once the producers have to deal with their waste, solutions happen.

Instead, what do we do? We put THEIR styrofoam in the garbage where it costs US money. Metro Vancouver is looking at half a billion dollars in capital costs over the next few years to build all those fancy waste incinerators that will vaporize plastics into the atmosphere.

It's our choice: build incinerators, or use the law to compel producers to design products and packaing responsibly so there will be no hidden social or environmental costs.

This is going to be an exciting year!