As Muskoka’s landfill capacity decreases day by day, all mechanisms are on deck to try and prolong the life of the Rosewarne site in Bracebridge—the only operating landfill left in Muskoka.
Current forecasts predict that Ontario will run out of landfill capacity in nine or fewer years, while Muskoka will run out of landfill space in nine to 10 years. The forecast for Muskoka takes into account incremental and seasonal growth, “but certainly the growth that we’ve been seeing over the last number of years is beyond sort of what was estimated,” explained District of Muskoka Commissioner of Engineering and Public Works, James Steele. He added that if Muskoka’s population continues to increase exponentially, the model will need to be readjusted.
“In the grand scheme of things, we’re probably better off than other folks in the province but still under capacity constraints,” noted Steele. “I think the industry is really concerned about it because ultimately the waste will still continue to arrive for disposal. Part of the folks in the province export landfill garbage to the United States and so we’ll have continued reliance on that.” Steele said other municipalities are looking at alternative means of disposal. For example, York and Durham have a shared energy centre where the waste is incinerated and the energy is recovered. It’s an expensive way of disposing of garbage and only really works for large population centres. “It’s not very predominant across Ontario right now but I think we’ll have to sort of be creative on how we address… the provincial constraint that we have,” said Steele.
“We’re under the gun, figuratively speaking, but I think what’s important is to extend the landfill as long as possible so that we can defer and give ourselves the amount of time that we need to figure out where ultimately the materials will go,” he said. “How do we squeeze out as much capacity from the existing landfill so that we don’t have to find a new site and/or expand a landfill beyond where it is? I think it’s inevitable that we’ll need some new site in Muskoka but the longer we can delay that, I think it certainly is the best for the environment but also the best for taxpayers as well.”
The District is expected to kick off its solid waste master plan next year, which will look at options for future disposal capacity and it may include a new landfill. It may also include exporting Muskoka’s waste elsewhere as well as looking at alternatives such as incineration. Ultimately, whether to pursue recommendations from municipal staff will rest with District council.
Steele emphasized the importance of extending Muskoka’s landfill as much as possible to give decision-makers an opportunity to explore options.
Garbage bin site transition
The sites don’t comply with the Environmental Protection Act, explained Steele. He said he understands their removal is an inconvenience for those who use them “but for the most part what we’re trying to achieve is moving to a system that supports them the way they need to be supported, whether it’s through expanding curbside collection or having a lakeside collection where a truck pulls in once or twice a week and allows people to drop off their materials at that time.” He said almost half of the sites have been transitioned and there hasn’t been a marked increase in illegal dumping. He noted the importance of taking ownership of the material one puts out and that’s not something that happens with garbage bin sites, which are also more often than not an eyesore.
Recycling program
Last fall the District moved to single-stream recycling, so you don’t need to sort your recyclables anymore. Check out a list of what’s recyclable HERE.
The recycling material is collected and taken to a building at the Roewarne landfill site in Bracebridge and pre-sorted for obvious items there. “So we have a loader operator that takes out big things that can’t go into the recycling, like appliances for example,” explained Steele. The type of materials that are visible to the eye, and not recyclable, are removed.
From the Rosewarne site the material is shipped to a processing plant in North York, which uses technology, “like artificial intelligence to sort the materials so that you don’t have to do it at the curbside,” explained Steele. “And what we’re seeing there is we’re able to recover the vast majority of the materials than perhaps might have been missed in the more manual sorting that we had in the previous work that we were doing.” The material is compartmentalized into different groups, like plastics and metals, and then it is packaged and resold as material for other forms of production. “There is a small amount that ends up going into the garbage, just sort of things that weren’t supposed to be there. You know, we’re not perfect, recycling isn’t perfect and so if someone inadvertently puts in the wrong thing in the bin, that gets pulled out and it becomes… what we call residual and that ends up going to the landfill.” The good news, said Steele, is that about 90 per cent of recycled material is recovered.
While under provincial legislation, municipalities have been responsible for the residential recycling program—which includes waste produced by single detached homes, multi-residential dwellings, seasonal dwellings, and vacation properties—the District will also accept commercial waste at its sites. It does not, however, have the jurisdiction to tell commercial entities how to manage their waste. However, Steele said the private sector does have an obligation to the Province to manage its waste appropriately, especially now that the Province has shifted to what’s being called producer responsibility. For example, the fact that the lids of Tim Hortons cups are now white as opposed to dark brown, which is what they were in the past, is a result of the Province’s shift. Another classic example is grocery stores no longer packaging prepared food or meats in dark plastic trays— that’s because black plastic materials are difficult to recycle because they are not easily detected on a conveyor belt, and businesses are now being required to recover a certain percentage of the material they use for packaging.
“So what we’re seeing is changes in the packaging environment that allows those materials to be recycled,” explained Steele. “So black materials are problematic in the recycling stream. And so what we’re seeing in the industry is the folks who are now responsible because of the extended producer responsibility are making business choices to say, ‘Hey if I have to retrieve x per cent of this material, I can’t put out materials that can’t be recycled,’ and so that’s the sort of shift that we’re seeing in the industry,” he explained.
Historically, municipalities were paying about 50 per cent of Ontario’s blue box program. With the shift to extended producer responsibility, producers will be responsible for 100 per cent of the cost of managing those materials, explained Steele.
“For Muskoka particularly, in November 2024, the producers will take over the blue box stream from Muskoka. So they’ll be responsible to collect, they’ll be responsible to manage those materials, and responsible to put them into beneficial uses. So what the taxpayer will see is generally they’ll put the material out the same way but it’s just who is collecting it may be different.”
In terms of oversight, the Resource Productivity and Recovery Authority, an entity mandated by the Province, will be responsible for the oversight of the new system, including other materials such as hazardous waste, added Steele.
Green bin program
The District plans to roll out the program to every property that has curbside collection in Muskoka, although at the moment the focus is on the communities of Bracebridge and Huntsville. “It is a multi-year project but we are continuing to move the needle on it,” said Steele. Those who receive the green bin service are required to put out one instead of two bags of garbage per week.
And yes, green bins are a stinky business, and while some prefer to line them with compostable bags, which is fine, said Steele, straight organics is preferred. Check out the list of what goes in the green bin, HERE.
The materials from the green bin program go out to either the Rosewarne landfill or to the Beiers Road transfer station and it is composted naturally by bacteria and cured over time. That material is then offered to residents as free compost or used by municipal public works departments.
Want to know more about waste in Muskoka? Click, HERE.
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Ralph Cliffe says
The clock is ticking on Muskoka’s landfill capacity.
How much is industrial waste/garbage?
Give industry the priority to save jobs and penalize the householder.
Will it come down to burying garbage in our backyards?
This is 2023 and no one has a better idea??
Maybe Hugh and Mr. Ford can come up with an amazing idea??
Anzie Witlox says
As a local Realtor for 30 years, there is not a question “if” Muskoka’s population continues to increase exponentially, the model will need to be readjusted. START READJUSTING AND CONSIDER EVERY DAY THE POPULATION IS GROWING IN MUSKOKA AND BEYOND.
This needs to be addressed yesterday
As a community there are many ways we can all contribute, with the benefit going to the taxpayers and citizens.
Brian Tapley says
Well, as Ralph suggests, a “better idea” is needed here.
Over the next century, maybe less, there is going to be a migration from areas along the coastlines, places where most of our big cities are located, as the sea level rises to the point that a lot of these cities will no longer be viable.
How do you feel about some of these millions moving to this area?
How about Barrie, maybe part of Toronto, maybe a total population pushing 25 million?
North Bay, 5 million.
Sudbury 5 million and so on. Huntsville maybe half a million along with similar increases for all the other towns.
Are our gifted leaders going to sit in their gilded council chambers and just dig more holes for landfill. Maybe they will just do nothing and say it is someone else’s problem.
Already, by the definition of a “dump site” used by the MOECC, all our roads would class as “dumps” and they can only get worse as people realize they make excellent dumping grounds.
If you are darn fool enough to pick up this trash, at your own expense in time and effort, you get rewarded by being treated as an untrustworthy liar at the transfer station and getting charged for the “other peoples” junk that you laboriously picked up to make the area look better. Some reward this is.
And we have not even touched on how we are going to grow food for all these people ad Doug and his buddies are paving over farm land as fast as a paving machine can move. This is a one way street so to speak. We shall need this farm land in the near future. We can’t always import food from Mexico.
What we need to do is somehow reclaim and reuse (words our current township seems to like to use) but we really need to do this with nearly 100% of our current waste. It can be done but it will require a lot more thought than reducing bag limits and increasing charges while bemoaning the fate of a landfill site here and there.
Hugh Holland says
Europe is away ahead of us on waste management. Denmark gets 36% of its total energy supply from high temperature waste incineration. Sweden gets 28% and Germany gets 11%. They generate electricity and use the co-generated heat for industry and for district heating of residential and commercial buildings. Meanwhile, we in Canada continue to dump our waste in emission-emitting landfills and create even more emissions every day by hauling Toronto’s waste to remote locations, first in Michigan then to London, Ontario. How silly is that?
After 10 years of failed efforts to locate a new landfill, and endless protests about a waste-burning incinerator, Durham Region bit the bullet, shared with York Region to improve the economics, and engaged a company with global experience to build the Durham-York Energy Center. The Result? A facility along the 401 east of Oshawa that looks like a modern office building, reduces waste volume by 87%, generates 153,000 MWh of electricity, co-generates 105,000 MWh of useful heat, saves 146,000 tons of CO2 vs landfill, recovers 4,140 tons of metal, and meets all Ontario emission regulations.
As a retired professional engineer, I strongly recommend that District of Muskoka officials visit the Durham-York Energy Center if they have not already done so. Ideally, Muskoka would share with an adjoining district and locate such a facility near an industrial site that could use the co-gen heat, such as a cement plant.
Brian Thompson says
I agree with Hugh Holland as the long term-medium term solution to our garbage problem is incineration…during my years on Muskoka District Council and on District Public Works, much of our time dealt with garbage, landfill sites, garbage bins at so many vulnerable drop off points near our lakes to accommodate island cottagers and those with lake access only…I think we did come up with creative solutions for those that chose to be responsible….and that is by far the choice of the majority.
We introduced the restricted bag limit while expanding the green bin program and that seemed to help.
But, the massive influx of new residents to Muskoka, plus those seasonal residents that chose to make Muskoka a more permanent address has added to our numbers not foreseen by growth studies from even a decade ago.
The pandemic seems to have been a huge factor in our recent unprecedented population growth and ergo the tremendous increase of trash, both residential and industrial.
So my point in agreeing with Hugh Holland and the use of incineration….we looked at that in the past and it boiled down to a case of economics….at that time Muskoka did not produce enough trash to justify the cost of creating an incinerator…BUT…I think if we work with our neighbours in the Near North, and North Simcoe County and the growth we are all experiencing, we just might have the numbers to make it feasible.