Recycling Contamination is on the rise
Recycling contamination is on the rise across the nation and there is much more that is needed to be done to ensure recycling programs can continue to operate. China, the primary importer of recycled material globally, has restricted recycled waste submissions to a contamination rate of just 0.5%. Countries unable to meet this threshold face fines or are forced to return their recycling home where it adds to close-to-capacity landfills.
The Situation
9/10 people find recycling more confusing than investing, doing their taxes, or assembling Ikea furniture.
The confusion leads to high contamination rates, poorly executed recycling programs, and increased fees issued to municipalities. Contamination rates are as high as they have ever been (link to post one). We are not only contaminating our recycling stream, but we are also failing to recycle acceptable materials. Of the 292 million tons of municipal solid waste collected in the United States in 2018, just 32% was recycled or composted. Compared to the total amount of municipal solid waste that was landfilled, 146 million tons (or 50%), we could be doing a lot better considering numerous reports indicate a large portion of landfilled waste can be diverted. This becomes a double-edged sword, we are failing to submit acceptable recycling materials, and the recycling we are submitting is flawed with high levels of contamination. This has forced municipalities to cancel recycling programs. More than 1,000 recycling plants in California have shut down over two years due to the recycling contamination crisis. Additionally, here is a list of recycling providers across North America that have canceled their recycling operations.
Existing Strategies
Education is a needed strategy to increase the awareness of acceptable and unacceptable recycling materials, but city-wide education campaigns fail to create sustainable change. City-wide pamphlet drops, generic social media ads, and billboards are all strategies that have been used to spread recycling education but have failed to solve the contamination problem. Contamination rates have stayed at historically high levels, which begs the question: Why don’t these strategies work?
Broad, generic recycling campaigns fail to identify recycling violations and don’t provide relevant, custom education that is needed to create sustainable behavior change. Many households are recycling correctly the majority of the time, but have minor slip-ups. Spray and pray marketing approaches fail to provide households with the custom education they need to make subtle improvements. On the other hand, households that are consistently making recycling violations are not held accountable with blanket marketing campaigns, nor are they provided with meaningful feedback to make recycling behavior change. As a result, Contamination rates stay high, and sustained recycling behavior improvements are not achieved.
Current education campaigns leave citizens without the relevant information they need to make meaningful recycling behavior improvements. Without recycling awareness, many households adopt wish-cycling. Wish-cycling is well-intentioned, citizens want to recycle but are unsure if certain items are accepted and default to recycling items that are not accepted in hopes of making a positive contribution.
Additionally, recycling is often viewed as a “second garbage” where items overflowing in the garbage cart are moved to the recycling cart. These actions add to the already contaminated recycling stream. But because 75% of waste is recyclable, yet only 34% of it is recycled, greater recycling education and proper material placement can lead to positive change in the recycling stream.
Custom education helps municipal administration to A/B test
Custom education provides residents with relevant education to help make incremental recycling improvements, but it also helps municipal workers track recycling behavior improvements. When education is custom and relevant to each household, municipalities can measure recycling improvements over an experimental period. Municipalities can perform experiments to discover the most impactful recycling campaigns and measure how receptive households are to certain forms of education. As custom education is issued, municipalities can track the engagement, measure contamination rates, and identify the most effective method of delivery.
The Impact
Custom, relevant education is new to the recycling industry but has proven to be the most impactful for creating sustainable recycling behavior change. Prairie Robotics ran a 4-month pilot program with the City of Regina in 2021. We performed automated recycling cart audits on 11,875 and issued custom education to 9,875 households. We observed 41.5% of households made recycling improvements after receiving custom education. Improvements include a reduction in contaminants submitted in the recycling stream and sustained improvements in recycling behavior after concluding the pilot project.
Prairie Robotics pilot project in Regina was not the first of its kind, there have several other manual cart audit projects introduced across North America that have achieved a reduction in recycling contamination. The Region of Peel conducted a curbside audit and education program in 2020. Initial audits found 73% of households had less than 10% contamination in their blue cart. After issuing education, the number of households with less than 10% contamination rose to 94%. Custom recycling education for each household is impactful, and a meaningful step in reducing curbside recycling contamination.
While there have been countless innovations in the recycling industry, recycling levels haven’t improved in the last 20 years. Presented by unchanging, high contamination rates across North America, blanket education campaigns are not working. Generic education fails to provide households with the feedback needed to make incremental recycling behavior improvements.
Custom education is the solution. Specifically, custom education that is directly tied to a household's most recent recycling submission is most effective. Through custom education, sustained recycling behavior can be achieved and contamination can be kept out of the recycling stream.
