The Town of Smithers has won first place in the Reducing Contaminants Recycling Competition.
Last June the District of Port Hardy, the District of Summerland, and the Town of Smithers challenged each other to reduce contamination levels in their community’s curbside recycling programs.
Smithers won for reducing its rates of contamination by 40 per cent.
High levels of contamination pose a big challenge for collection, post-collection processing, worker’s safety and the environment. By reducing the overall average contamination rate, the efficiency and effectiveness of the recycling process improves.
“It’s great to hear our community has managed to reduce recycling contamination by such a large percentage,” said Smithers Mayor Taylor Bachrach in a press release. “Thank you to all of our residents who are paying extra attention to the materials they are putting in their curbside recycling containers. Together, we can minimize the amount of waste heading to our landfill.”
Recycle BC facilitated the challenge using its audit data to determine the results.
Smithers will receive a prize of a bench made out of recycled plastic for its efforts.
For more information read this week’s edition of The Interior News.