A one stop-shop for waste
Eco-Cycle, a Boulder, Colorado-based non-profit recycler, has conceived plans for a “zero waste” industrial park model designed to keep resources out of incinerators and landfills. Based on executive director Eric Lombardi’s work with a Hawaiian community group considering landfill closure and incinerator construction, the park would be a one-stop facility for truckloads of pre-sorted city waste.
The model pulls together solutions to waste disposal like composting and recycling, which are typically managed in separate facilities, into a single site, decreasing costs of inter-facility materials transfer and increasing capacity for interdependent operations, as well as profitability. The plans include a reuse center to help salvage items, a materials recovery facility to collect technical nutrients like metals and a public education center. There is a catch: citizens would be required to sort their waste three ways—into recycling, composting and trash—and about 10 percent of the waste would still eventually end up in a landfill.
(via Worldchanging)
