New York (AFP) – More than 40,000 tons of waste per day, 7,100 employees, 2,500 garbage trucks, the collection and treatment of garbage is a vital challenge in New York where the authorities have set a new goal, to recycle 30% of these mountains of garbage by 2017.
New Yorkers shed the most of all Americans: an average of 2.5 kilos per day, compared to 2 kilos in the rest of the country, according to the town hall. Huge black or transparent plastic bags pile up on the sidewalks in the evening, but also sometimes furniture, sofas, lamps in good condition …
“If the garbage collectors weren’t there, the city would quickly become unlivable,” said New York University anthropologist Robin Nagle, according to which these employees are even more important than the police or firefighters.
And the amount of garbage “increases every year,” said Ron Gonen, recycling manager for the city. New York, he adds, spends some $ 330 million to export its waste to other states like Ohio and North Carolina.
But in the last two years, the city of 8.4 million inhabitants, which does not collect commercial waste (shops and businesses) but only that of individuals and administrations – has taken a serious turn.
It has set itself the goal of reducing the recycling rate from 15% currently to 30% in 2017 (excluding organic waste), for the 11,200 tonnes of daily waste that it collects (commercial waste, collected by private companies is estimated to 29,000 tons per day).
The largest recycling center in the United States
The town hall has multiplied initiatives. It has also partnered with a brand new recycling plant in Brooklyn.
Since 2012, a pilot program has been launched in schools to collect organic waste. From 90 schools in 2012-2013, it was extended this year to 300 establishments.
From July 2015, restaurants, fast food chains and grocery stores will also have to separate organic waste and recycle it.
“Over the past two years, there has been a phenomenal engagement,” says Ron Gonen. “There is a lot of potential,” he adds.
“We are at the beginning of a transformation”, also declares to AFP Eric Goldstein, of the NGO of defense of the environment “Natural Resources Defense Council”. “We started slowly, we are not yet among the leading cities, like Seattle or San Francisco, but we are catching up quickly,” he says. He also mentions a “reduction in the increase in waste in recent years”, due to the financial crisis of 2008, new laws, but also a change in consumption.
“The major challenge is that the Bloomberg administration’s advances continue with the new mayor” Bill de Blasio, he adds, explaining the delay taken by New York by “companies and politicians focused on the court. term, and not over the long term “, and by the fact that” investment is needed “.
In December, an ultra-modern metal, glass and plastic recycling plant was inaugurated in Brooklyn, where they are processed by Sims Metal Management Municipal recycling, a world leader in the sector, under contract with the town hall.
It took ten years for the $ 110 million private-public Sunset Park project to come to fruition. The factory now sits on 44.5 hectares of land near the East River.
It is “the largest in the world, or at least in the United States”, explains to AFP its manager Tom Outerbridge, on a freezing January morning, while closely monitoring the personnel who are working on machines mostly German and Dutch.
The factory, which has an educational center for schoolchildren, currently operates 8 hours a day, but aims to operate 24 hours a day from the spring.
Of the approximately 800 tons of plastic, glass and metal collected by New York City per day, it already processes 272. The rest goes to neighboring New Jersey to another Sims factory. The two combined plants will, according to Outerbridge, be able to recycle 1,180 tonnes per day of metals, glass and plastic. The paper is recycled in other establishments.
Recycling is not only good for the environment. It generates income: an aluminum cube, as produced in Sunset Park, of about 680 kg, sells for more than $ 1,000.
