NCW Waste and Recycle Directory

UPDATE:  Thanks to your generous donations, are in the process of creating our waste and recycle directory! Keep an eye out at sustainablewenatchee.org in March for the reveal of this helpful tool!

With so many changes happening in the last several years on the recycling front, it is no wonder that many North Central Washington (NCW) residents find it difficult to distinguish waste from recyclables. The value of many recyclable materials has declined recently due to major global market shifts, triggered largely by contamination in the recyclables exported by developed nations. Because we have spent decades dumping many of our recyclables overseas, the United States is far behind in developing domestic processing capabilities for its own waste stream.

The local picture is further complicated by the existence of individual waste-management company contracts---with differing specifications at the county and city levels. The recycling market for glass---the original recyclable---has collapsed, prompting the development of several community glass-crushing projects (e.g., see Chelan’s 911glassrescue.org project). Great progress was made in 2020 with the opening of Chelan County’s Moderate Risk Waste facility; however, Douglas County continues to be a holdout in supporting that facility. Many residents are poorly informed and confused about the recycling and solid-waste streams in their area, resulting in contaminated recycling, more solid waste ending up in landfills, more waste being incinerated, and a potential increase in illegal dumping. Residents and business owners are constantly asking city and county officials, waste-management company personnel, and Sustainable Wenatchee staff, “How do I properly dispose of this?” and “Where to recycle that?”.

In 2014, those same questions and the need to reduce reckless hazardous waste disposal led the Spokane River Forum to develop an online solid-waste directory for Spokane County. The searchable, interactive directory made it easy for small businesses and the public to find where to dispose of over 250 types of waste generated by business and residential sources. The directory was an immediate success and was soon expanded to include Kootenai County, Idaho. This incredibly valuable online resource was just recently upgraded to include recycling vendors. In 2020, over 20% of households in the two counties used the directory at least once during the year. The Spokane-Kootenai Waste and Recycle Directory (www.spokanewastedirectory.org) continues to be a huge success---reducing landfill and incinerator input, the need for raw materials, and the potential for soil and water contamination.

We have the opportunity to create a similar online resource and success story for NCW. Sustainable Wenatchee, in partnership with the Spokane River Forum, has developed a proposal to create a Waste and Recycle Directory for NCW (prospectus available upon request). Spokane River Forum personnel and their contractor would create and populate the online directory structure and run it through a pilot period. Once fully launched, Sustainable Wenatchee would be responsible for program maintenance, including updating material and vendor listings. Creation and pilot testing of this NCW Directory will cost approximately $28,258.00. Subsequent annual maintenance is estimated to run approximately $3,000.00 per year. Creating this NCW Directory now would benefit from the fact that Spokane River Forum personnel have just completed their major upgrade and expansion of the Spokane-Kootenai Waste and Recycle Directory.

Sustainable Wenatchee’s plan is to meet this funding goal by December 31st and to contract with the Spokane River Forum in January 2022 to develop the NCW Waste and Recycle Directory.

Please consider supporting Sustainable Wenatchee’s campaign to raise the funds necessary to launch an online waste and recycle directory for North Central Washington!

Photo by John Cameron on Unsplash