City of Vancouver - Single Use Item Reduction Strategy
November 27th, 2019
Good morning, my name is Dr. Love-Ese Chile, I’m a researcher and consultant at my company Grey to Green Sustainable Solutions. My work is primarily focussed on bioplastics and their waste management and I am here today to speak on behalf of the innovators of new sustainable materials.
First, I would like to voice my full support for the recommended bylaws to reduce SUI as they apply to conventional plastics. However, I would like to suggest inclusion of wording stipulating that fees charged for SUIs will be collected and used to support waste management infrastructure.
In the case of compostable products, however, I am here to state my deep concern about including these products in the SUI reduction bylaws.
The CoV is an opinion leader in BC and in Canada, and I’m concerned that the choice to include compostables will have broader implications in the wider plastics debate. Bans are employed to dissuade use of problematic plastics, but I challenge the council to ask whether the goal is to stop the use compostable plastics or rather to ensure they have an appropriate waste management solution? The staff report justifies inclusion of these materials in the SUI ban because of potential contamination of Green Bin and Blue bin Programs. But compostable plastics make up only 0.05% of the municipal organics stream. Even the Organic Materials Recycling Regulation (OMRR) is currently being revised to allow compostable plastics. It’s in the IC&I sectors where compostables are being used the most but who are serviced by private haulers and organics processors. As such we should be supporting further innovation in the private waste management industry.
I must applaud the staff who worked on this report, they have a fantastic job assessing the state of the industry as it stands. In the work I do, I straddle the line between today and tomorrow.
The compostable plastic industry is growing and changing rapidly. This morning, as we speak, there is an online consultation on alternatives to SU plastics by Foresight and Innovation Canada. Across Canada new production facilities for a greater variety of readily degradable materials are being built and myself in my research am working on new waste management technologies for these materials. The challenges we face today may not be challenges tomorrow.
An explicit ban on compostable SUIs will stifle this innovation. I urge the council to encourage the development of these new technologies and I fully support Recommendation E to write to the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy on behalf of Council to ensure province wide harmonization of this support. If a short-term ban is deemed necessary, I suggest that a separate by-law for compostable plastics is written that stipulates that it will be revisited at regular intervals.
I’m in full support of the SUI reduction strategy but I also think its important to have a clear vision of what materials we want to be part of our future so we are creating enabling spaces for innovations that we haven’t even thought of yet.
Thank you.