Waste-free strategy won’t eliminate garbage on its own: report

TORONTO — Ontario’s goal of one day sending zero waste to landfill looks good on paper, but won’t be enough to completely eliminate garbage on its own, the province’s environmental commissioner said Wednesday.

The province generates nearly 12 million tonnes of waste a year — more than 850 kilograms per person — and only recycles about a quarter of that amount. That rate hasn’t changed in more than a decade, but the Liberal government has introduced a waste-free strategy that aims to divert 100 per cent of waste away from landfills, although it hasn’t set a date for that target.

The strategy aims to create a “circular economy,” where waste is considered a resource that can be recovered, reused and reintegrated.

It’s an “ambitious” goal, commissioner Dianne Saxe said as she released a report on it — and one that won’t be reached without other action.

“As long as it remains cheaper to buy new stuff and throw it away than to repair, reuse or recycle it, a waste-free Ontario will remain a pipe dream,” she said.

“In the long run, what matters most is moving Ontario to a circular economy, which means government must play a leading role driving policy that will foster the selfsustaining markets required to make this a reality.”

One pressing area that the government could quickly act on is organic waste, Saxe said.

Ontarians generate 3.7 million tonnes of organic waste per year, and greenhouse gas emissions from the waste sector mostly organics in landfill — account for six per cent of the province’s total emissions. As part of the waste-free strategy, Ontario is considering banning organic waste from being sent to landfills, a measure already in place in Nova Scotia and Metro Vancouver.

Saxe supports a ban, saying instead of emitting methane in landfills, organics should be sent to composting and digestion facilities. Environment Minister Chris Ballard said the province is still consulting on the idea of an organics ban. But there is more, beyond the strategy, that can be done, he said.