Counting Down to Zero: Solid Waste Planning in Los Angeles
by Neal Seldman
The City of Los Angeles is in the midst of an extraordinary planning process. No other city has made the commitment of staff time to meet with individual citizens, community organizations, waste-haulers, recyclers and processors in order to co-plan the system that will serve the city for the next 20 years. The city’s efforts confirm the adage that cities that listen to their citizens wind up with the most cost effective and environmentally benign recycling, composting and discard management systems.
Looming large in the background is the planned closing of the Puente Hills landfill, which has kept the cost of landfilling low for the past 40 years. When the facility closes in five years, planners expect disposal costs to rise from the $35 per ton range to the $80-$100 per ton range.
The future of garbage disposal in the Los Angeles region is not what it used to be!
The city starts from a very solid base. Los Angeles recycles 62% of its discards from residential and commercial sources. The heart of the system is the three-bin collection format, which has mixed recyclables, placed in blue bins, yard debris in green bins, and the remaining materials in a black bin. The city delivers materials to several private sector processors, which then sell the materials on the national and international markets. Each contractor pays the city an annual fee for the right to handle these materials.
L.A. recycles and composts more than any other large city in the U.S. Smaller cities such as San Francisco have a higher diversion rate. Recent steps have been taken to increase the level of diversion, including bulky waste pickup and recycling services to multi-unit dwellings, increased budget for public awareness and education, and support for L.A. SHARES, the non-profit internet based system for directing surplus corporate property to L.A.-based non-profit organizations and government agencies. (In 2007, LA SHARES directed over $11 million worth of items and diverted 2,500 tons of materials through the city’s District Councils.) The city has recently started recycling all plastic items, and is about to embark on a pilot food waste program and an expansion of its electronic scrap-recycling program. Finally, the city operates six SAFE Centers where citizens can drop off household hazardous materials such as paints, batteries, medicines, and pool and household chemicals.
The city has established a goal of 70% diversion by 2015 and 90% diversion by 2025. Six Waste Sheds have been established with a goal of each area of the city sharing the benefits and burdens of local processing facilities. The more materials that are handled at the community level, the less pressure there is on regional facilities. Further, the jobs created in these facilities will be available to local residents. These facilities will be designed to handle organic matter for composting, electronic scrap for refurbishing and hand dismantling, and will include pallet repair and other fix it shops.
City staff has been meeting concerned citizens and businesses monthly in each Waste Shed for the past four months. These meetings have helped determine program features, site requirements, and acceptable facilities. The planning process will continue through April of this year, when a citywide plan, based on stakeholder input, will be released. Interested citizens can stay abreast of all developments in the SWIRP process through the project web page.
The planning process has been interesting. Among the issues that have emerged are whether to recycle single-use Styrofoam (polystyrene) and plastic bags or ban them altogether, as some cities have done.
The table shows the value of these resources using current market prices for the commodity categories in the city’s waste stream. The goal is to recover these materials in cost effective ways in order to create a resource stream for industry and agriculture.
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Category |
% |
Tons per year |
$ per ton |
Potential Value ($ million) |
| Reuse | 2.0 | 72,000 | 550 | 39.6 |
| Paper | 22.0 | 792,000 | 20 | 15.8 |
| Plant Debris | 5.5 | 198,000 | 7 | 1.3 |
| Putrescibles | 17.0 | 612,000 | 7 | 4.3 |
| Wood | 4.0 | 144,000 | 8 | 1.2 |
| Ceramics | 13.0 | 468,000 | 4 | 1.9 |
| Soils | 10.0 | 360,000 | 7 | 2.5 |
| Metals | 4.0 | 144,000 | 40 | 5.8 |
| Glass | 2.0 | 72,000 | 10 | 0.7 |
| Polymers | 8.0 | 288,000 | 100 | 29.0 |
| Textiles | 2.0 | 72,000 | 20 | 1.4 |
| Chemicals | 0.5 | 18,000 | 15 | 0.3 |
| Other | 10.0 | 360,000 | — | — |
| Total Per Year | 3,600,000 | 103.0 |
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The ongoing planning process will help determine the most cost effective ways to realize the economic and employment value of these resources.
The results of the planning effort in Los Angeles will inform the rest of the nation. The city and citizens should be applauded for putting hard numbers on a zero waste approach for four million residents.
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