City of New Westminster goes single-stream with Urban Impact
January 16th, 2012
Urban Impact helps the City of New Westminster Go Green: article in the New Westminster News Leader
The City of New Westminster recently transitioned to single-stream recycling. The new system means residents no longer have to divide containers, newspaper and mixed paper between different recycling boxes. Instead, items like milk cartons, jars, cans, loose paper and cardboard can all be mixed together and dropped into a single cart.
The recyclables are then sent to our state-of-the-art recycling facility located in New Westminster—to be sorted and processed.
Our New Westminster Plant Manager Bing Magrata was featured in the article standing in front of bales of sorted material awaiting shipment to our plant.
We are helping City of New West go to single stream recycling
January 12th, 2012New Westminster has transitioned to single-stream recycling, which officially rolled out this past week.
The new system means residents no longer have to divide containers, newspaper and mixed paper between different recycling boxes.
Instead, items like milk cartons, jars, cans, loose paper and cardboard can all be mixed together and dropped into a single cart.
Those recyclables are then sent to our state-of-the-art recycling facility located in New Westminster—to be sorted and processed. Urban Impact recently spent a significant amount of money last year upgrading its New Westminster facility with the latest recycle processing equipment.
“Without investing in this technology, we essentially limit our growth,” Worldwide, recycling is trending towards single-stream systems; bucking that trend is not going to work.” Urban Impact CEO Nicole Stefenelli
Read more in the New Westminster News Leader
Meet Mark Popp, Business Development Representative
January 4th, 2012Congratulations to Mark Popp on his new position at Urban Impact within the Sales Department as a Business Development Representative effective Jan 2, 2012.
Mark’s career with Urban Impact started in 1993 when he joined the company on a part time basis while completing his University studies. Upon completion of his degree, Mark joined Urban Impact on a full time basis as a Driver, and eventually drove all of our trucks. After 7 years as a Driver, Mark took a short break from Urban Impact. When he returned, Mark assumed a new position as Operations Supervisor with responsibilities for both Trucking and Warehouse Operations.
Mark’s vast knowledge and expertise of Urban Impact and the recycling industry has been and will continue to be a great benefit to the company and now to the sales team in particular. Mark is looking forward to wearing his new suits and meeting many of our existing as well as new customers.
Mark’s will be based out of the New West office and he will spend approximately 1/3 of his time in the Calgary office. You can reach Mark by email or his cell phone at 604.841.4284.
Waste Audits: Property Managers can find inefficiencies and identify Cost Savings
December 28th, 2011Reducing costs and environmental impacts are key objectives of waste management plans. As property managers become more conscious about the environmental performance of their buildings, it is becoming increasingly important for them to be able to benchmark and monitor their progress.
Is EPR going to solve the problem?
December 18th, 2011
Urban Impact President and CEO Nicole Stefenelli shares her thoughts:
Municipal governments in Canada have long been complaining that the cost of municipal solid waste (MSW) is their problem, and it should not be. Just because the consumer happens to consume and discard the product within their boundaries … does not mean that the burden of cost should be theirs.
To solve the problem, Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) will save the day!
Personally, I don’t believe that EPR will solve the entire issue at hand. Printed Paper & Packaging EPR will begin in early 2014, a new stewardship program for BC. In late 2011, 16 stewards in BC, are trying to successfully transfer the burden of cost to the producer or first importer in BC. I think it is safe to say, that in many cases such as tires, oil, drink containers and electronics that this is largerly true. But the sad reality is that although the burden of cost has been transfered, the real problem has not. The real problem, in my view, is our consumerism. Our insatiable appetite for products is driving our waste and refuse problems.
There is a simple pollution prevention hierarchy that exits. The hierarchy and should drive all of us to think about our consumerism, it begins with avoiding waste when ever possible, if avoiding cannot be achieved, then Reducing (what we produce), if you can’t do this, then make sure to Reuse it, if you can’t reuse it then be sure to Recycle it, if it cannot be recycled, perhaps it could be managed and Recovered (burnt and turned into energy) and lastly, Disposal (landfill).
Pollution Prevention Heirarchy
I don’t think it is reasonable for the consumer to understand or remember the entire hierarchy. But, fundamentally if each time we were about to make a purchasing decision, we at least tried to consider the purchase and its contribution to waste, then perhaps we would start making a difference! Really EPR cannot solve our problems, it is thoughtful and careful consumer choices that will drive us to reducing our waste, and limiting our damage on our world’s resources.
