Toronto’s blue-bin system is breaking down, triggering both alarm at city hall and upcoming penalties for homeowners who toss clothes, black plastics and other non-recyclables in their boxes.“This is a big problem, a very significant problem,” Councillor Jaye Robinson, public works chair, said after a city official warned of a projected $9.2-million plunge this year in recycling revenues that Robinson called “significant and terrifying.”Jim McKay, the solid waste general manager, told Robinson and her committee colleagues three factors are bedevilling one of the continent’s most sophisticated city recycling systems.Contamination in bins — including black plastic commonly used for takeout food, plastic-lined paper coffee cups and food waste left in jars – now comprise more than one-quarter of the 200,000 tonnes collected annually from Toronto homes, and the problem is growing.Part of that is homeowner error that lowers city revenue from buyers who sort and sometimes toss it, McKay said, but those buyers are also being more picky. That relates to the second factor, China recently banning the import of some waste and seriously restricting others, shrinking the market.“A piece of paper with a coffee stain on it is now garbage,” McKay said. “Previously that still would have been able to be recycled. A half-jar of mayonnaise in a blue bin on the street can ruin the entire contents of that blue bin. If it gets mixed around enough it could theoretically ruin the entire contents of the truck.”The final factor, he said, is a delay in the Ontario government and local partners developing and implementing a system whereby producers of waste are responsible for its sustainable disposal. That theoretically eliminates the need for cities to have, or at least fund, blue-bin systems.McKay doesn’t expect to see a plan for the province’s “full responsibility model” for at least one year ...
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