Have you ever wondered what happens to all the garbage and recycling that you put out at the curb every week? Well we decided to find out and take a tour of our local city waste station. Edmonton is in fact very fortunate that we house a rare, world class facility that looks after all our city’s residential waste. After running out of landfill space, our city was forced (thankfully) to look at more sustainable practices and remedies. Our current waste management site opened in 1975 and has been building and growing since then. It is located in the northeast of the city on a 233 hectare site. The Edmonton Waste Management Centre (EWMC) is North America’s largest collection of modern, sustainable waste processing and research facilities.
Facilities located at the EWMC include:
- Materials Recovery Facility, where Edmonton’s recyclables are sorted and baled
- Edmonton Composting Facility, where Edmonton’s waste is composted
- GEEP Electrical and Electronic Waste Recycling Facility, where Edmonton’s electronics are recycled
- Residential Waste Drop Off Station
- Construction and Demolition Recycling Operation
- Clover Bar landfill
- Leachate Treatment Plant, landfill gas recovery system and biosolids lagoons
Facilities currently under construction at the EWMC include:
- Integrated Processing and Transfer Facility
- Biofuels Facility
- Greys Paper & Glass Recycling Facility
It is amazing how we take for granted all that goes into getting rid of our trash and recycling! If you have never asked the question or been out to see your local waste management site, you should! EWMC gives tours to any group of at least 10 people for free! They booked us a bus and had a great tour guide to show us around for a good 2 hours. Now I am feeling much more sure about what happens to every piece of garbage and recycling my family is putting out to the curb, some good and some not so good, but my choices are clear.
We have included some pics of us on our tour. You will see our family, my sister and her daughters, my girfriend and her kids and both our dads. It was a great experience had by all, a little smelly at some points (the kids loved that!), but well worth the trip!
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Keith
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The Edmonton Waste Management Centre is a poorly managed facility. The pungent vile stench created by the transfer station permeates the entire Ne area of Edmonton and Sherwood Park. Everyday, there is 300 tonnes of rotting garbage left to rot for an undisclosed period of time. The required procedure would be to process all garbage by the end of the day and disinfect all equipment.
The stench has an extremely negative impact on the lives of thousands of people- during the summer we are forced to remain in the house with the windows shut (it is ruining our lives). The stench has forced a camp for disabled children to cancel or change programming.
The windrows of compost also produce a stench because its another process that’s poorly managed.
The problem could be rectified with $ however its the NE and apparently not worthy.
The City of Edmonton should be ashamed of its waste management program.
It does not deserve accolades from you or the waste managemnt community. The City of Edmonton, management of the EWMC and Mayor Mandel should be ashamed.
Before you shower the facility with praise, ask yourself “Is it appropriate for this facility to generate a stench so strong, so vile (somedays it smells like a decomposing body) that it ruins homes and businesses?” Or, do you live in SW Edmonton and not really care?
I think you bring up some good arguments for people to be more responsible for their own consumption and waste Teresa! The one thing that did disapoint me on our tour, was that some people walked away feeling like they didn’t need to recycle or compost, because the city was going to do it for them. So your points provide us a great argument to those that want to pass on the responsibility that should ultimately be their own. If more people used their own composters at home, maybe this would help a lot towards reducing the stench (that yes we sure noticed while we were there!) that is affecting neighbouring communities. Point well taken.
Edmonton has world renowned facilities, a daily diinfection is out of the question when you deal with the vast quanaties of waste as they do. They process over 60% of trash and keep it out of landfills, and in three years they are on track to be at 90%. I think we shoulkd be thankfull for the services they provide. The location may be inconvienient but the needs of many outway the needs of a few.
The problem isn’t that people are not composting. The problem is that the EWMC is mismanaged and using 1970′s technology.
There are hundreds of tonnes of garbage left to rot in the transfer facility, there is no ventilation system and it is never disinfected. There is also no odour detection system.
The transfer facility should be cleared every night and disinfected. There should also be a ventilation system that maintians negative pressure.
When hundreds of tonnes of garbage are left to rot in a open aired facility, its going to stink no matter how many people compost.