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Scott Cassel first learned about the concept of extended producer responsibility (EPR) from a speaker at North American Hazardous Materials Management Association’s (NAHMMA) annual conference 20 years ago. At the time, he was the director of waste policy and planning at Massachusetts Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA), where he was working to solve a financing issue for managing end-of-life products, including household hazardous waste.

“Our government did not have the money to do all that needed to be done,” Cassel says. “EPR provided an answer to our funding question.”

Cassel explains product stewardship is a broad term that relates to efforts to reduce the health and environmental impacts from the manufacture, sale and end-of-life management of consumer products. Related initiatives, such as Call2Recycle’s battery recycling program for consumers or local legislative bans on plastic bags, can be voluntary or regulatory. EPR, a subset of product stewardship, refers to legislation that extends responsibility to manage end-of-life consumer products to manufacturers and consumers.

In 2000, Cassel held the first national product stewardship forum in Boston, drawing more than 100 government officials from 20 states. The forum led to the creation of Boston-based Product Stewardship Institute Inc. (PSI), of which Cassel is the CEO and founder. For the first couple years, PSI’s representatives spoke about EPR at conferences across the U.S.

“At that time, there were very few people using the term ‘product stewardship’ and nearly nobody using the term ‘EPR,’” Cassel recalls, adding that how the program would work, who would fund it and what the results would be “are questions we had to answer at the outset. All of that and more is what we did the first couple of years.”

Cassel’s vision for PSI was to “develop a voice for state and local governments in the U.S.” and help these governments develop models to fund the management of end-of-life consumer products, which costs governments “millions and millions” of dollars per year, he says. Electronics and paint were the first products PSI focused on.

A successful model

Ten percent of all paint purchased in the U.S.—about 78 million gallons per year—goes unused. According to PSI, it costs an average of $8 per gallon to recycle, which means it “costs more than $500 million to manage” end-of-life paint in the U.S. total. In addition, about 80 percent of the paint can be recycled into new paint.

Beginning in 2000, PSI worked with the paint industry to create a paint stewardship bill, which was signed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and supported by state and local governments, recyclers and paint manufacturers, Cassel says. The legislation has been passed in 10 states, including Washington, and is pending the governor’s signature in New York.

The bill is funded by an “eco-fee,” which charges consumers about 75 cents per gallon. The money goes into a fund that is managed by the industry. In addition, the states enforce legislative goals for paint manufacturers to meet that include paint collection and recycling mandates as well as education and outreach benchmarks. PaintCare Inc., a program of the American Coatings Association (ACA), now manages the stewardship program and provides services, including setting up collection sites, conducting education and reporting to government agencies.

"Our government did not have the money to do all that needed to be done. EPR provided an answer.” –Scott Cassel, CEO, PSI

“We have more than 1,700 voluntary collection sites,” Cassel says. “There’s infrastructure developed and an awareness created through education, so this is really an efficient program.”

The paint bill has led PSI to launch the International Paint Recycling Association (IPRA), the first organization to represent the recycled paint industry, which has recycled more than 30 million gallons of unused paint for residential and commercial markets. IPRA is also developing the IPRA Green Standard certification program to guarantee certified products meet stringent performance standards. The organization has also launched RecycledPaint.org to answer common questions about recycled paint and to connect consumers with recycled paint companies.

Increasing interest

In the U.S., 118 EPR laws have been adopted across 33 states. The laws cover 14 product areas, including electronics, pharmaceuticals, batteries, paint, mattresses and mercury-containing thermostats and lamps, among others. PSI has worked to develop EPR regulations on nearly 20 products.

Among the notable accomplishments the organization touts is that it developed the first national computer take-back program at Staples in 2004.

“Now those sites are all over the country and they’re part of the infrastructure with laws regarding the collection of electronics,” Cassel says. “That was a voluntary initiative.”

He adds, “The paint project was the signature success of our organization early on. It showed producers and manufacturers could come together and develop a reasonable solution with government and other stakeholders. The electronics take-back showed we could develop a solution with retailers.”

Another model PSI worked on was a pharmaceutical take-back program.

“Each product has its own challenge, and we have to figure that out with the experts—our members who are the state and local government officials around the country,” Cassel says. “For pharmaceuticals, we needed to change the federal law.”

Under the federal law, pharmaceuticals could not be collected at pharmacies or any location without law enforcement present.

“Our organization led a national effort over six years to change the federal Controlled Substances Act and also the corresponding Drug Enforcement Administration regulations to allow pharmacies to collect these controlled substances since they’re the most convenient place,” Cassel says.

For 15 years, PSI has also worked to develop EPR laws and programs to manage packaging, including single-use plastics. Cassel says the “fact that government is always stuck holding the bill” and “because there needs to be a multifaceted approach to the packaging issue,” governments are “starting to wake up to the fact that this is a problem they need to deal with.” EPR laws related to packaging and plastics passed this year in Maine, Vermont and Washington. Bills were also introduced in Massachusetts, Indiana, Connecticut and California, Cassel says.

“There’s increasing interest in EPR, and there will be interest, I hope, from producers and manufacturers to sit down and work on a program that works for them,” he says.

Continuing the momentum

Today, various nonprofits and associations, including the Northeast Recycling Council and the National Waste & Recycling Association, are involved with the development of new product stewardship and EPR legislation.

“When we started, we could not get groups except the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition to participate in our EPR efforts,” Cassel says. “They didn’t have the capacity for it. Now, these groups are key lobbyists. They’re our partners. We work with them to help pass legislation, so that’s a huge change.”

Reflecting on the past 20 years, Cassel says PSI, along with the organization’s partners, has been “largely responsible for building the capacity” for product stewardship and EPR legislation in the U.S. The goal now is to “continue the momentum” and create “framework” EPR models. Maine is one of the leading states in the movement, ranking within the top three states with the most EPR laws passed every year.

“Given the thousands of consumer products sold today, achieving comprehensive, successful EPR programs for a broad array of products and waste streams is an uphill battle if we are to pursue it one product at a time,” Cassel says. “A framework legislative approach establishes a consistent and comprehensive process for creating and passing new EPR laws that follow best practices based on years of experience.”

The author is the digital editor for Waste Today and can be contacted at kmaile@gie.net.

Congress has made notable advancement toward pushing waste diversion and recycling legislation this year. In July, Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota introduced the Zero Waste Act. If enacted, the legislation will provide $2.5 million in grant funding to local governments with projects geared toward the development of city and regional recycling capacity and the strengthening of domestic markets for materials that have limited end users. The proposed legislation would support sustainable solid waste management in the U.S. in a way that could be leveraged by local governments seeking to increase waste diversion through the use of alternative solid waste management strategies.

One way that municipalities can capitalize on this policy window is by creating comprehensive solid waste management plans that prioritize organics collection, processing and utilization by purchasers. To make impactful solid waste ordinances, municipalities must understand the supply of organics in their jurisdictions and the demand for soil amendments regionally. To do so, analysis tools like waste characterization studies and organic waste market studies can be useful. By gauging the supply and demand of organic-related materials, cities will be better positioned to advance their regional compost markets.

Local governments can also conduct benchmarking reports to identify cities with high waste diversion rates and compare strategies in relation to their own to begin the process of enacting organics diversion policies. During this process, governments should be sure to benchmark cities that have similarities related to factors that affect their organics markets, including population, processing capacity and presence of end users. Cities can refer to the EPA website at www.epa.gov/transforming-waste-tool for waste diversion and reduction support guidance.

Highlighted strategies include:

• Influencing the supply of compost in local markets by expanding curbside organics collection service for residential areas, as well as creating drop-off locations. The city of Portland, Oregon, for example, initiated a weekly organics curbside collection program of yard and food waste in 2011. Within one year, the city diverted 8,000 tons of food waste from residences. The city also switched to weekly recycling collection and biweekly refuse collection to further encourage residential organics disposal and recycling collection.
• Including incentives for organics waste diversion and productive use of organics within service provider agreements with waste haulers, such as through lower franchise fees. The city of Cupertino, California, for example, entered into a five-year franchise agreement with San Francisco-based Recology in 2010 that included the incentive of a contract extension based on the city’s achievement of a 75 percent diversion rate by 2015.
• Increasing organic waste processing capacity locally by considering waste conversion technologies. For example, through a public procurement process, the city of San Jose, California, selected the Zero Waste Energy Development Company (ZWEDC) and their dry fermentation anaerobic digestion and composting facility to process the city’s commercial waste. This contributed to San Jose’s overall 66 percent recycling rate in 2015.
• Influencing local compost markets with green procurement strategies. For example, King County, Washington, recently implemented an environmentally preferable product procurement policy requiring subcontractors to use soil enhancers from local composting facilities in their maintenance and construction projects.

While different markets require different strategies for diverting organic waste, looking outward to successful practices already being implemented can help local governments identify smarter—and more environmentally friendly—ways to manage waste.

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Of all the times to start up a nonprofit organization, most would not venture to do so on the brink of a major economic recession.

But in 2009, “right when the economy was in freefall,” Arlan Preblud says he began noticing a trend when he volunteered for nonprofit agencies that provided meals to those in need. The agencies were struggling to keep their funding, demand for meals was ever increasing as more people fell on hard times, and all the while, food waste continued to pile up.

“As a foodie, I started asking people in the restaurants I visited what they do with the food at the end of the evening. They said they had to discard it,” Preblud says.

Preblud soon realized that the problems were primarily caused not by a lack of possible solutions, but by a lack of streamlined services neatly tying the issues together to tackle them all at once.

Preblud’s involvement in nonprofits soon transformed into establishing his own called We Don’t Waste. Based in Denver, the organization collects uneaten food from restaurants, caterers and other establishments and redistributes it to organizations that provide free meals.

Since its founding in 2009, the organization has done more than provide tens of millions of meals to those in need—it has also made a significant environmental impact, all of which is tracked fastidiously by Preblud and his staff of 10.

Food with integrity

As the seedling of Preblud’s idea began to take root, he discovered chefs would be willing to donate uneaten food if they had the resources available to do so.

“Chefs and cooks across the board hate to throw food away,” Preblud says. “That [thought helped begin] the process of developing some systems and checking what regulations I’d have to overcome.”

Preblud says his largest challenge when starting up was fear of liability. It’s a common problem among food donors—in a national survey conducted by America’s Second Harvest, more than 80 percent of the companies surveyed responded that the threat of liability for food-related injuries was their greatest deterrent for not donating excess food.

However, Preblud found that as long as reasonable steps were taken to maintain the integrity of food, both he and the donor would have liability protections from the national Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act of 1996.

“I used that as the answer to any food donor. I told them there is no liability as long as they do everything necessary to protect the product,” Preblud says.

With that, Preblud was in business. From his Volvo station wagon, he says he “put the seats down, bought a tarp at Home Depot and started calling caterers.” Many entities Preblud contacted began keeping their unused food, labeling it and storing it in their fridge for him to pick up.

Preblud’s operations quickly grew from working with caterers and restaurants to larger food generators, such as sports stadiums and arenas. Some days, We Don’t Waste staff is constantly on the move tracking pallet donations and delivering them to one of nearly 60 different community agencies the organization works with. On others, volunteers are scanning kitchens in the suites of the Denver Broncos Stadium at Mile High in search of unpurchased wings, pork tenderloin and other game-time grub to repackage and redistribute.

The We Don’t Waste staff also coordinates regularly with the nonprofit agencies on the opposite end of the receiving line to assure they do their part in maintaining the integrity of the food. Everyone on We Don’t Waste’s staff is certified to handle food by ServSafe, a food and beverage safety training and certificate program administered by the National Restaurant Association.

“When we get a call from an agency that wants to participate, we send staff out to do a site visit to make sure they have the proper storage and utensils, they maintain polices and they follow strict guidelines,” Preblud says. Once that happens, the agency gives staff an idea of how many servings it typically needs, and the staff gets to work trying to meet that need.

Coordinating between taking food in and distributing it to those who need it is a delicate balancing act of supply and demand that requires the staff to determine where each product should go without draining inventory.

“If we don’t get fruits and veggies in today, we won’t be able to put fruits and veggies out tomorrow,” Preblud says. “We have to be nimble in recognizing what we do have, who can use it and what we put out.”

Data tracking

Managing the wealth of food coming in and being redistributed out from We Don’t Waste is only possible through meticulous data tracking, Preblud says.

We Don’t Waste uses Salesforce software to track the details of each donation it receives, including the number of servings, when it perishes, when it was delivered and its value.

This data has two uses. The first is to give a receipt to the donors, which they can use for tax records. The second, and perhaps most vital to the operation, is to track the constant influx of inventory to maintain food quality and assure minimal waste.

Preblud’s staff uses the data to color-code each donation received based on its shelf stability. Pantry items that are shelf-stable, for example, are coded green, while food that needs to go out in less than five days is coded red.

Just a few years ago, We Don’t Waste didn’t need to keep such detailed inventory records. As the organization had no warehouse, all food needed to be redistributed the same day it was picked up. But in November 2017, the team finally found a space to call home—an 11,500-square-foot distribution center with 1,000 square feet of refrigeration and two freezers.

“Each morning, the staff goes into the computer and looks exactly at what we have in the warehouse, how much we have and where it is with getting [shipped] out. For example, if we’ve got five pallets of product and take two out today, the computer shows there are three pallets left,” Preblud says. “Before this facility, we didn’t have to worry about inventory because it went out the same day. Now, we know exactly what we have at any given moment.”

For more detailed data tracking, We Don’t Waste also uses a program called Domo that assesses the environmental impact of donations. In addition to detailing exactly what food the donors provided, Preblud provides donors with a Domo report, which outlines the carbon dioxide equivalent they diverted from landfill, how much water they saved and more.

“Not only are we providing stakeholders with information on what they’ve donated to us, but they’re also provided information pertaining to the total impact of their donation,” Preblud says. “We think that’s a very valuable piece of our organization.”

The future of food

We Don’t Waste has come a long way since Preblud began hauling food in his station wagon a decade ago. The organization now works with nearly 150 food donors and reaches roughly 100 different community agencies around the Denver area.

Since 2018, the organization has provided nearly 33 million servings of food to about 200,000 individuals.

In addition to the warehouse, We Don’t Waste now has three refrigerated trucks to transport inventory.

They’re additions that have been instrumental in the organization’s fight against both food insecurity and food waste. According to estimates, 63 million tons of edible food are sent to landfill each year. Preblud is working to change that by targeting not only excess food, but also food that never made it to the consumer stream to begin with because of its appearance or other minor issues.

For example, Preblud says he recently received a call from a company with an 18-wheeler “packed with fresh produce” that was destined for a distribution center. When the dock master checked the temperature of the first two pallets loaded on the truck, they weren’t up to code and couldn’t be sold. But even though the other 25 pallets of food on the truck were an adequate temperature, the dock master declined the entire shipment.

“That happens, unfortunately, all too regularly,” Preblud says.

In another case, several pallets of water bottles that were destined for a casino were headed to a landfill instead, all because they were mislabeled with an incorrect logo.

In both cases, Preblud recovered the imperfect but edible products and redistributed them within days.

Another venture Preblud is working on is mobile food markets. Preblud has begun taking one of the organization’s trucks to a local food desert—an area of a community where nutritious food has scant availability—and sets up banquet tables with shelf stables, fresh produce, dairy and protein. “Folks take whatever they need, and we don’t charge for any of it,” Preblud says.

Even after a decade of operations, We Don’t Waste is continuously working to overcome pain points related to food and fiscal sustainability in the region.

“We have to compete with other nonprofits in the community, but as you grow, you become more nimble with that,” Preblud says. “You build within your organization the key people you need to facilitate development of grants and the like.”

The organization’s continuing perseverance has paid off. It recently received a Denver Metro Chamber of Commerce 2019 Business Award for Large Nonprofit of the Year. But for Preblud, We Don’t Waste’s greatest accomplishment to date has not been the recognition, but instead its service to the community.

“I think the proudest accomplishment for me is the fact that we took an easy and obvious need and found a supply,” Preblud says. “Now, that supply meets that need on an everyday basis so that we’re feeding more and more people, we’re recovering more and more product, and we’re keeping it out of the landfill.”

The author is the assistant editor for Waste Today magazine and can be reached at tcottom@gie.net.

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Landfill operators know them all too well: quite possibly the most frequent visitors to their sites, birds can be squawky, ravenous mess-makers that often overstay their welcome.

The various types of birds that post up at landfills, whether seagulls or falcons, can present a nuisance to employees and the surrounding community alike.

And while a growth in population of these species’ more iconic cousin, the bald eagle, is celebratory news to many, the population boom is creating issues both within and outside landfill boundaries for many sites throughout the country.

The Cedar Hills Regional Landfill in Seattle is one such site, and the mix of bird populations in the area has required innovative solutions for warding them off.

“We’re dealing with eagles and starlings and ravens and gulls. There are many species we’re managing, so the approaches can vary,” says Pat McLaughlin, the director of the King County Solid Waste Division, which oversees the landfill. “You try to be as proactive as you can, but then as they change their habits, you have to adapt your strategies.”

Know your birds

Though bald eagles are not the primary bird visitors most landfills see, their recent population boom that officially took them off the federal list of threatened and endangered species in 2007 has required new bird diversion strategies. As one of the largest birds in the country, they don’t always respond to the traditional scare tactics that work on small species. To make things more complicated, they’re protected under the federal Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act from being harmed, trapped or disturbed in any way.

Whether it’s an aggressive eagle population or another species that occupies a site, the first step for operators looking to ward off any bird population is knowing what they’re dealing with.

“Your strategy always depends on the dominant infestation at any given site,” says Michael Gallion, the head of business development of Carson, California-based Bird Barrier, which provides bird diversion products and strategies for a range of sites.

Different types of birds respond to different solutions, so identifying the primary visitor narrows down diversion options. For example, products like bird spikes are effective in keeping pigeons from roosting on roofs, but larger birds can pluck the spikes right off.

Doing research on a site’s primary visitor, including into their feeding behaviors, preferred resting places and responses to disturbances, can go a long way.

McLaughlin says his team has worked with a number of biologists, consultants and organizations to help devise a plan of action. For sites looking for assistance, companies such as Bird Barrier also offer consultation and planning services.

“We really try to partner with many agencies and professionals to understand best practices, be on the leading edge and also make sure that while we’re trying to mitigate the risks of site impact, we’re respecting the wildlife in the process,” McLaughlin says.

Limit resources

Whether dealing with eagles, smaller birds or a mix, the primary diversion technique remains: identify their main motive for visiting the landfill and remove their access to it. This is especially important to do before the birds nest in the area, if possible, since nesting equates to a more permanent presence in the vicinity.

A 2015 study of bald eagle behavior near landfills in the Chesapeake Bay region of the U.S., for example, found that juvenile eagles were the most likely age group to seek food from landfills, while most others were just looking for a place to rest.

That’s why resting places are one of the primary elimination targets for McLaughlin and his team at the Cedar Hills landfill as they work to prevent eagles from getting comfortable there in the first place.

“We have some retaining walls that birds like to nest in, so we’re filling in those gaps that may otherwise provide a dark nook and cranny for them to rest in,” McLaughlin says. “It’s also important to make sure that there aren’t ample food and water sources either, so no shelter, no food and no water.”

Normal landfill maintenance, such as keeping grass short and covering waste daily, can also be effective in discouraging bird populations from taking up residence in a landfill.

“Simple things like putting lids on trash cans or keeping dumpsters closed can have a huge impact,” Gallion says. “If they know dumpsters are left open, they will habituate to that situation.”

Photo courtesy of King County Solid Waste Division

Target their senses

While removing basic resources is a useful tactic, it’s often not enough to completely eradicate bird issues, especially if they have nested in the area.

These birds are considered “residents,” Gallion says, and are much more difficult to uproot. The goal is to get them to relocate, which often takes care of the issue long-term or even permanently.

“In general, your strategy in bird control is always to relocate resident birds. Trash creates an environment that attracts the birds, and eventually the birds will pick up residence because it’s proven to be such a viable resource to live off,” Gallion says. “Typically, when they relocate, they don’t ever come back.”

A variety of products exist to fend birds off the site for good, from distressed bird call noise deterrents and mild shock systems to undesirably scented products and light reflectors. These solutions target birds’ various senses and trick them into believing a threat exists in the area.

Optical gel, for example, is a product that tricks birds into thinking a fire is in the area by reflecting UV lighting, creating the illusion of flames for birds, Gallion says.

These techniques need to be employed in a combinational approach for maximum efficacy. Birds are bold, and when they encounter a threat continuously, they often venture to examine it further. If they rule out a threat, they begin to ignore it and return to the site.

Even optical gel, which also has scent and tactile deterrents for when birds get close enough to touch it, should be used alongside other systems and techniques to confuse the birds long enough for them to decide to leave. “It’s almost like an antibody. If you use the same antibiotic over and over, the body gains immunity to it,” Gallion says.

Techniques should be introduced strategically on a rotating basis. The best strategies use techniques that comprehensively cover all areas of the landfill, including the perimeter and any office spaces where the birds can nest.

“In terms of waste and recycling customers in these big, wide-open spaces, a very specific strategy initiative has to be involved,” Gallion says.

Thinking outside the box

Over in Seattle, McLaughlin has tried a few products created specifically to deter birds. One was a drone disguised as a hawk, which had varying success depending on the bird.

For the eagles, it didn’t go over well.

“The eagles were not a fan of the drone and took it right out of the sky,” McLaughlin says.

Instead, officials there have had success with trapping and relocating smaller birds, and with bottle rocket-type pyrotechnics for dispersing larger groups of birds. One of their most successful deterrent techniques is one of the most traditional, albeit with a unique twist.

McLaughlin says the crew dresses up a scarecrow in a bright vest and hard hat to look like the staff member who deploys the other bird diversion techniques, tricking the birds into thinking he’s constantly present.

“For us, it’s been taking a combination approach, but also constantly being aware of what’s working and what’s not,” McLaughlin says. “All these things help, but we haven’t found a silver bullet or a one-shot homerun approach.”

While the biggest problem with birds is often the nuisance, they can also be a health hazard to landfill crews if they carry disease. Ingesting waste can cause the birds harm as well, which presents its own issues. And in some cases, bird problems can filter out into the surrounding community. Residents near the Cedar Hills Regional Landfill have complained of finding waste scattered across their yards and blame the eagles at the landfill for the mess, according to the Seattle Times.

“It’s not so much an operational challenge with our ability to manage waste. It’s an operational challenge for us to try to manage the birds,” McLaughlin says about the nearly 200 eagles that occupy the landfill in peak season.

The King County Solid Waste Division is currently in the process of developing a bird management plan to track the types of bird visitors at the landfill and develop mitigation solutions for each one. McLaughlin says they’re doing so not only with the help of the organizations they’ve consulted with in the past, but also with a wildlife biologist they plan to hire and keep on staff.

“Some of these animals are very smart,” McLaughlin says. “You have to evolve your approach. It’s standard for a period of time, and then the standard needs to keep changing to make it effective.”

The author is the assistant editor for Waste Today magazine and can be contacted at tcottom@gie.net.