DEM renews focus on business recycling

Since 1996, all Rhode Island businesses have been required by law to recycle, though only businesses with 50 or more employees are obliged to report recycling activity. Enforcement of the law has been nonexistent over the past decade, due to conflicting priorities at the R.I. Department of Environmental Management, said Terry Gray, assistant director for air, waste and compliance at the DEM. But now, he said, the agency is set to revitalize and re-energize its commercial recycling effort.
Some 2,300 Rhode Island businesses recently received letters from the DEM announcing the statewide recycling initiative. The businesses were identified from data compiled by the R.I. Department of Labor & Training and the R.I. Economic Development Corporation.
The initiative recognizes the limited lifespan remaining at the state Central Landfill in Johnston, Gray said, as well as “that municipalities and individual homeowners have been doing their part to recycle, while it has remained unclear that the business sector is doing their part as well.”
With the help of a broad partnership across regulatory and private agencies and associations, the DEM has initiated educational programs and an outreach plan. A new online reporting tool developed for businesses already has been launched.
“The big issue we have is, we don’t know what is really going on in the business sector,” Gray said. The online reporting tool will help the DEM to “understand what the baseline is, and understand the climate of activity, so we’ll finally be able to put some numbers to it,” he said.
Alyssa Silva, the commercial recycling coordinator at the DEM, is prepared for an anticipated increase in phone calls and questions. She also will go on-site to office facilities and offer feedback and recommendations on how to recycle. “Depending on the sector,” she said, “we are deciding what is most reasonable for them to recycle and how to make it happen.”
But high-profile businesses and national corporations have had recycling programs and guidelines for some time now.
“National companies are more likely to have an umbrella policy in place for recycling that their local facilities can work under,” said Gray. But for the smaller businesses, “it just might not have made it to the top of the list in terms of priorities,” he said.
Small businesses – those with fewer than 20 employees – represent almost 90 percent of all employers in the state. Without an incentive to recycle or other support from the DEM, there is little reason for small businesses to prioritize recycling programs.
For small companies, Alyssa Silva said, “it costs almost as much to recycle as it does to have trash picked up, essentially doubling the bill.”
Until small businesses get to the point where they are recycling enough to reduce the number of trash pick-ups, the price stays high, whereas “for some of the large companies, their recycling ends up paying for their trash,” she said.
The first wave of the DEM initiative has focused on feedback from larger companies, such as hospitals, universities, insurance companies and banks, to understand what they are recycling and how they do it.
But since industries have different modes of operation and produce different kinds of waste, compliance expectations have to be different, as well.
For the hospitality industry, for example, a new statewide certification program will rank facilities based on a 300-point system. With DEM’s approval, the Green Hospitality and Tourism Leadership Council, in partnership with the Rhode Island Hospitality and Tourism Association, has started offering workshops on how to receive “green” certification.
“If you look at federal standards and take into account New England’s beautiful historic facilities – they don’t match,” said Dale Venturini, president of the hospitality association. “We need to figure out how to go green in a way that fits our needs,” she said. “Working with the DEM, we decided for ‘operational green’ rather than ‘construction green.’ ”
The information sessions – open to hotels interested in receiving the certification – outline steps to attaining green performance standards, implementing best management practices and complying with environmental regulations.
“We are focused on the lodging community right now,” said Venturini. “They produce the largest draw of visitors to the state, and since most hotels have corporate ownership, it is easier to implement change.”
As the year progresses, the association will also be helping to develop educational programs for the food service, transportation and tourism industries.
In the past, the planning and reporting of recycling proved to be resource intensive for businesses.
“The DEM created a very bureaucratic process,” said Gray, “where we required lots of plans, proposals subject to the department’s review and approval, subsequent implementation of the plan, and then a lot of backup reporting.”
The new commercial recycling effort is being developed to try to ease that burden a little bit, Gray said. •

No posts to display