The waste debate

As you may or may not know, Metro Vancouver is currently undergoing a review process to determine what to do with its waste in the future. The current landfill at Cache Creek is nearly full and they need to find a new solution. A new landfill has been pretty much ruled out, as had shipping the waste across the border to a facility in southern Washington - both terrible ideas to begin with.

The leading solution right now seems to be the construction of a large new waste incinerator. There is already one in the lower mainland. Now, I have little to say against waste incinerators - they are in use all over Europe and the new incinerators are very efficient and produce little air pollution. In addition, the excess heat is used to generate electricity and hot or steam to heat local buildings, resulting in a very low overall carbon footprint. Of course one large plant is only going to be able to heat so many buildings - the hot water can only go so far before it cools down to a useless temperature. So rather than one large plant, several smaller plants would make a lot more sense. Also, decentralizing the system would reduce the distance trucks had to drive to the plants.

But I fear than Metro Vancouver is getting ahead of itself. First of all, let me point out that Metro Vancouver is responsible for only about 60% of the region's waste. The other 40% goes to the Delta landfill in Delta which is owned by the City of Vancouver. Aside from Vancouver, the waste from Delta, Richmond, White Rock, the University Endowment Lands and portions of South Surrey also goes to the Delta landfill. At the current maximum authorized disposal rate, the Delta landfill could accommodate Vancouver's solid waste disposal needs for another 30 to 40 year. Of course Metro Vancouver is eyeing this landfill as a solution to their problem, but fortunately the City of Vancouver is not taking their request lightly.

Like the City of Vancouver and other municipalities, Metro needs to do more to reduce waste in the first place before charging ahead with an expensive incinerator or other mega-project solution. And if Metro indeed wants to become a Zero Waste region as they are proposing (http://www.zerowastevancouver.com), here's what they need to do first:

• Reduce the amount of waste generated in the first place - put limits on allowable packaging, require more returnable/refundable packages (like bottles and cans are already), etc.
• Encourage reuse of materials - construction waste is a big opportunity here; for example lumber doesn't need to be mulched or burned if it's still in good shape. Also, don't demolish buildings, deconstruct them to remove as much of the reusable materials as possible instead of everything ending up in one giant heap.
  
• Mandatory recycling - too many people don't recycle (or don't do it properly), and yet it's so easy to do. Implement fines for failing to properly sort waste, and set-up a waste sorting plant to catch any recyclables that make it through. At the same time, make it easy for people to do!
  
• Compost - people should be doing this in their yards, but those in apartments can't. Either way, set up a composting system that collects all yard and organic kitchen wastes and then turns it into compost to be put back into the ground in gardens.
• Curb-day - start an annual or semi-annual "curb-day" where people set old furniture, etc that they don't want out on the curb for others to come by and take for free. I remember doing this over 15 years ago in Waterloo, Ontario and it was a huge success. Any items that don't go can be left on the curb for pick-up the next garbage day, and hopefully recycled. Right now most of these kinds of things go straight to the landfill without any possibility of diversion. Also, encourage local community garage sales.

We have two cities that are great examples of waste reduction right nearby - Seattle and Portland. The region should be looking to them as well as existing local facilities and programs for more suggestions on how to solve their problem. Right now the region diverts just over 50% from the landfill, but the cities below show we can do better.

Seattle Transfer Station
Seattle breaks recycling record
Even better than Seattle: San Fran, New York, Portland

Then, what's left over can be disposed of as required, but must be done as efficiently as possible. Use the waste heat from an incinerator, capture the landfill gas to use for heating or power generation, etc. And don't forget - try to ship all the waste as short a distance or by as green a means as possible...see my last post about Skytrain freight. :)

"SkyFreight": Freight on SkyTrain? Why not?

I've been wondering if there has ever been any consideration to using SkyTrain for local shipment of goods/freight. It seems like a perfect way to increase the use of a system that is already in place, and being fully automated, would be easy to integrate into it. It would also be an additional revenue source with relatively small start-up costs since the rail lines are already there. Let's call it "SkyFreight".

"SkyFreight" cars could run independently in the gaps between passenger trains. There could be short branch lines or sections with a third track that would divert the freight lines to small depots beside the existing tracks where local trucks would pick-up and drop-off. A standardized container system would make it easy to onload and offload, and should be designed with long-distance rail in mind, so goods could be easily transferred to and from heavy rail freight trains (CN, CP).

Being able to take goods from depots on the edge of the city into the centre by "SkyFreight" would drastically reduce the number of transport trucks in the city. I can see this being a great way to ship garbage and recycling out of the inner city to a location much closer to the disposal facilities, eliminating thousands of garbage truck trips. This system would also integrate perfectly at the airport - imagine if containers could come off a plane, be rolled onto the "SkyFreight" car and be on its way without sitting in a depot. Courier services like Fedex and UPS could see a huge benefit from such a system, as they could locate depots next to train lines (in the most populated areas) and ship containers of parcels from there directly to the plane at the airport, rather than all their trucks having to drive there. Trains could run uninterupted at night when the passenger trains aren't running.

It's a very futuristic idea - automated "SkyFreight" cars (of a distinctive colour and design to differentiate from SkyTrain cars), continually shuttling goods around the lower mainland with a minimum of human input and releasing no pollutants into the air. Makes me think of scenes only seen in movies of cities of the future.

Vancouver's 2010 Streetcar

This is the first time I've heard about this Olympic Streetcar Line. Too bad they aren't testing it further along this rail line, which already exists all the way down Arbutus Street to the south side of the city. In particular, stops in Kitsilano (Burrard and 6th), at Broadway/Arbutus, and in Kerrisdale would get lots of traffic.

http://www2.bombardier.com/vancouver/index.html

Transport Truck of the Future

When you think about it, transport trucks (tractor-trailers, 18-wheelers, whatever you want to call them) really haven't changed much in the last 50 years. Sure they've become bigger and more powerful, but there has been no big improvement in their efficiency. With the huge mileage these trucks travel, it would make sense to develop efficient powertrains and streamline the exterior design to save fuel and money. Fuel is no doubt the truck drivers biggest expense, and with fuel costs going nowhere but up, a more efficient truck would sell itself. Of course we should also be getting more freight onto rail for long distances to reduce the number of trucks on the road. Trucks operating between a rail depot and the local area would be ideally suited to alternative powertrains such as hybrid or electric. There are hybrid buses out there already so moving that technology over to trucks should be pretty easy.

Fortunately there are companies out there working on this, and the article that inspired me to post this entry is here: The Highly Sophisticated Transporter (HST)

The transport truck is a great vehicle for a hybrid engine and green technology in general.

• Tons of space for batteries - less need to cram them into every nook and cranny to save valuable interior space like a car.
• A huge surface area available on which to install solar cells to help charge the battery.
• The trailer could help drive itself - motors at the wheels or even a simple drivetrain could power it as well as help charge the batteries through regenerative breaking. This would reduce the amount of power required for the tractor.
• Streamline the design. This is the simplest one of all, and I'm amazed that large trucks are still pretty much a box being pulled by a slightly more aerodynamic box. The HST shows what's possible.

Hopefully we'll start seeing some of this technology soon - not only is it more efficient, but look at how cool the HST is!