Weighing trash cans, door-to-door collection, dumpster rental services, sorting ambassadors… In West Palm Beach, in surrounding counties and elsewhere, experiments are underway to reduce the amount of waste and collect it better.
One day in 2018, behind the windows of a glass building with a falsely futuristic appearance in the “City” of West Palm Beach, the administrators of the joint union of cities in the Greater Palm Beach conurbation, were faced with a dilemma. They were in charge of processing the waste produced by the region’s 124,000 inhabitants.
Since the 1970s, an incinerator had been responsible for burning more than 50,000 tons of waste per year. Two furnaces, one built in 1978, the other in 2003, were running continuously. That day, elected officials had to decide: should the oldest of these two furnaces be renovated?
Against all expectations, rather than investing in a new, costly infrastructure that would be harmful to the health of local residents and the environment, the union chose to review its entire waste management policy, and drastically reduce production. They wanted to change the paradigm, try to do waste management differently.
With rather effective results. Between 2005 and 2020, residual household waste incinerated went from 54,000 tons to 30,000 tons per year, according to the EPA. With an average of 670 kilograms of waste (glass, recyclables, household waste combined) produced per inhabitant per year, the West Palm Beach territory has become one of the most efficient in Florida in terms of waste reduction. As a reminder, in Florida, an inhabitant produces on average 780 kg of waste/year, or 110 kg more than an inhabitant of West Palm Beach.
In the Greater West Palm Beach urban area, incinerated residual household waste went from 54,000 tons to 31,000 tons per year between 2004 and 2020, with a reduction of dumpster rental usage as well.
There is no miracle, it is the involvement of users. It’s true that there is a specific culture of respect for nature in Florida: residents perhaps feel more involved than elsewhere, and worry about plastic pollution more.
To achieve these results, the counties that make up the union have implemented two tools: the incentive fee and the recovery of biowaste. The goal is to reduce waste at source. A principle summarized by the director of Same Day Dumpster Rental West Palm Beach: “The best waste is the one we don’t produce.”
In 2012, Florida adopted a program called “Waste on a diet” thanks to local funds. The principle is simple: the more waste you produce, the more you pay. The less you fill your bins, the less you pay. Each bin is chipped and weighed when it is collected, so that each household pays according to the volume of waste sent to the bin. Simple. And effective.
At the same time, they have implemented a generalization of local composting. 70% of residents in the municipalities in the area can access a composting point. And they are aiming for 100% by January 1, 2026. In the city, collective composts have been installed at the bottom of more than 300 buildings. In rural areas, individual composting is encouraged too.