We’re at the end of a two-part media event this morning put on by Seattle Public Utilities and the mayor’s office to start intensifying the reminders that the way you handle your trash/recycling is changing in a big way at month’s end. Rates are rising, pickup dates are changing, weekly food/yard-waste collection is happening, and you’ll be able to recycle more items (and you won’t have to separate the glass any more). First part of the media event is in the photo above – on a Beacon Hill streetcorner, the mayor and a neighborhood family used plastic props to demonstrate the new push for more food recycling. Second part, we’ll be adding video in a bit – we and the other media reps were taken inside the gigantic recycling-sorting facility at 3rd/Lander in Sodo …. (photo added 4:48 pm)
… for a look at what happens AFTER your recycling is picked up, BEFORE it’s sent off to whoever’s buying the “raw” materials. Loud, smelly, fascinating. Clips to come.
Here’s more info on the upcoming changes. Specific info on your new collection day should arrive in your postal mail. ADDED 4:14 PM: 1st video clip and some extra info:
That’s from the start of the media tour inside the recycling-sorting facility, which is at 3rd/Lander in Sodo, across Lander from Seattle Public Schools HQ among other things. The machinery and workers there separate what you throw into the bin, and from there, it is trucked out to whoever’s buying the material – about 20 trucks a day, they told us. Here’s the view in another direction (HUGE facility with lots of machinery and no single overview):
Here’s a snippet of the Seattle Public Utilities news release related to today’s events:
One of the new solid waste contracts — with Rabanco, Ltd., to process and market Seattle*s recyclable materials — will create 40 new, full-time sorter positions at the company*s state-of-the-art recycling center, at 3rd and Lander. The new employees will earn family wages and full medical benefits — an improvement over nearly all local and national processing facilities, where the standard practice is to fill sorter positions with temporary employees who are paid substandard wages and receive no real benefits.
It’s hard to tell looking at that video clip (and even the one or two we will add), but execs say this plant is indeed high-tech. One of the devices they mentioned before we all went into the facility is an optical sorter that can pick out types of resin as plastic items rush by.
If you haven’t read up yet on all the changes, you absolutely have to – while you’ll be paying more for trash pickup, you’ll also be able to recycle more (aluminum foil, more plastics, among other things) – here’s that link again.
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