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Date: 2/20/01
Time: 1:54:05 PM
Remote Name: 209.102.67.135
Remote User:
I suggest we look at what other municipalities are doing. One thing is certain, without cooperative ventures with, say Island County, perhaps Skagit and even farther afield, we won't be able to achieve the economy of scale needed to create a viable market for recyclable materials. Examples: Plastics #1 and #2 are recycled into plastic products such as childrens toys. RCL#5 (I believe it is) releases highly toxic fumes. Paper/plastic juice cartons and milk containers (which are not collected locally recycling--probably because we dont' produce enough of this waste to interest a re-user--are used to create street sign posts and park benches and picnic tables, but these are useable only in cool climates because the materials tend to melt in hot climates.
It's fortunate that we are able to reuse unsorted glass locally as a road surfacing material combined with asphalt, (here's another problem: impervious surfaces reduce ground water recharge (among other problems). (How often does one solution creates another problem?) There will come a time when San Juan County will have paved as many roads as it dares permit. Then what do we do with the glass. Glass sorted by color is more easily recycled into everything from new bottles to fiberglass insulation.
Couldn't we use old tires in road surfacing? These must be even more difficult to recycle than glass. There must be a lot things old tires could be used for, and if not, then we need to find uses.
In Vancouver, B. C. scrap drywall is recycled. In Cowichan (on Vancouver Island) they have developed a new green waste facility which is a model of its kind. We need to look into what Cowichan has done.
But whatever we do, we _must_not_sacrifice_the islands _water supplies_ nor the waters of the Sound around us.
Joanne