Mayor Greg Nickels of Seattle has rolled out an ambitious plan to further reduce the amount of garbage being sent to landfills, increase recycling and to rebuild the city‘‘s two aging transfer stations. He is also eyeing up the prospects for banning plastic bags and styrofoam.

Under the agreement - prompted by a Council study of Seattle‘‘s recycling potential and the need for new or renovated recycling and disposal stations - Mayor Nickels has committed to substantially increasing the city-wide recycling rate while limiting the amount of garbage being sent to the city‘‘s disposal facilities. In addition, the agreement will not add a new truck-to-rail garbage transfer station in south Seattle.

"Seattle Public Utilities and the City Council have identified a number of strategies that could enable Seattle to move beyond our current goal of 60 percent recycling, to the very cutting edge of recycling and waste reduction, " Nickels said. "This can play a key role in our efforts to reduce climate-changing pollution. Every pound we recycle reduces greenhouse gas emissions by two to three pounds. "

Key provisions of the agreement include:


reconfiguring and rebuilding the existing Wallingford and South Park stations to increase operational efficiency. Constructed in the 1960s, the stations are outdated, subject to frequent breakdowns, and lacking in adequate environmental controls to meet the city‘‘s current and future solid waste and recycling goals.
increasing the city‘‘s long-term recycling goal beyond the current 60 percent objective to about 70 percent by 2025.
establishing a waste reduction goal that would limit the amount of garbage Seattle sends to the landfill in future years at 440,000 tons - the amount of garbage the city disposed of in 2006.
expanding yard and food waste collection service to single-family households by 2009.
conducting a study of products, packages and ingredients which could be banned, such as plastic bags and Styrofoam. This study will include: identification of potential products, packages and/or ingredients that could be banned in the near future; the costs and benefits for individual bans; criteria for evaluating bans; and an evaluation of available substitutes for anything proposed to be banned.
increasing reuse, waste reduction and recycling of construction demolition waste through the modification of the city‘‘s current demolition permit by the end of 2008. SPU will work with the Seattle Department of Planning and Development to accomplish this and explore incentives and disincentives to developers and contractors to accomplish waste reduction goals.

"Some of these new opportunities will require people to make an extra effort, " Nickels said. "If we succeed, we can reach a recycling rate of about 70 percent by the year 2025. That would save more resources and eliminate millions of pounds of greenhouse gases. "

"The people of Seattle are passionate about wanting a solid-waste strategy that embodies their environment values. I‘‘m very pleased that the Mayor and I have found a way to do that, " Conlin said.

Beginning in 1998 the City Council made a series of policy decisions regarding recycling levels, waste reduction and additional facilities. Those decisions led to SPU‘‘s recommendation to upgrade the current transfer stations, while adding a new truck-to-rail garbage transfer station on Corgiat Avenue, south of Georgetown.

Upon receiving SPU‘‘s recommendation, however, Councilmembers decided against building the new intermodal facility.

Seattle has had a long-established goal of recycling 60 percent of all the waste generated by its residents and businesses. In 2002, the city‘‘s recycling rate had stagnated at less than 38 perce