Still Time to Weigh In for a Stronger County Zero Waste Plan

ACTION ALERT

• Come to the June 15, 2024 County Board meeting and let the County Board know your views. For information on how to participate and tips for speaking see our Demystifying Speaking at the County Board. 
• Send an email to the Arlington County Board asking them to commit to a more ambitious Zero Waste effort to reduce the climate impact of our waste stream

Read EcoAction Arlington’s letter on the Draft Solid Waste Master Plan/Zero Waste Plan

Arlington County is poised to adopt a new 20-year Solid Waste Management Plan on June 15. Citizens now have a rare opportunity to influence the future direction of waste reduction and recycling in Arlington. The plan has many good initiatives, but it settles for modest improvements rather than making changes that could substantially reduce the negative environmental impact of Arlington’s solid waste. 

First, the plan should focus more on waste reduction than on recycling and should acknowledge that waste disposal creates a large amount of greenhouse gases (GHG). Currently, the SWMP looks only at the GHGs that are generated by the operations of the trucks and facilities that process our trash. The report also should consider the carbon embedded in what we throw away, especially food and plastics.

Ask the County Board to say that our climate crisis requires the County to consider the GHG emissions of all its actions and it shouldn’t wait until 2044 to focus on reducing such emissions from our waste stream. 

Second, Arlington’s government should show some leadership in reducing the amount of waste we produce. In 2015, the County Board adopted a resolution that says, “the Board understands that local government should lead by example and that waste prevention, reuse, recycling, and composting are waste management strategies that conserve our finite natural resources while reducing environmental impacts.” However, the SWMP draft prepared by staff ignores this objective, stating “County facilities and schools are considered part of the County’s commercial generating sector and are subject to the trash and recycling requirements for those properties as provided in the County Code.”

Ask the Board to remain faithful to its 9-year-old resolution and require the County government to show leadership in waste reduction.

Third, all the construction activity in Arlington has created a great deal of construction and demolition (C&D) waste. We don’t know how much of this type of waste we create, because Arlington doesn’t regulate this waste and makes no effort to control or quantify it. However, EPA says that, nationwide, C&D waste is more than twice as large as the rest of the waste stream from municipalities. We should not ignore this potentially huge amount of waste just because the state of Virginia doesn’t require that we regulate it.

Ask the County Board to direct County staff to complete a study of C&D waste, including estimates of its volume, and to look for best practices to reduce or recycle as much C&D waste as possible.

ACTION ALERT
If you haven’t done so already, let the County Board know that you want the County to commit to a more ambitious Zero Waste effort to reduce the climate impact of our waste stream by sending an email to countyboard@arlingtonva.us. 

Come to the June 15, 2024 County Board meeting and let the County Board know your views – public comments carry a lot of weight with the County Board. For information on how to participate and tips for speaking see our Demystifying Speaking at the County Board. 

Click to Send and Email to the Arlington County Board

SAMPLE EMAIL

[Please feel free to tailor to express your concerns and priorities in your own words]

Dear Chair Garvey and County Board Members:

I am disappointed that the proposed update of the Solid Waste Management Plan/Zero Waste Plan fails to reflect the intent of the County Board’s 2019 Zero Waste Resolution. The plan does not acknowledge the climate and environmental impacts of our waste disposal or prioritize waste reduction as a key strategy to achieving the County’s zero waste goal. Instead the plan focuses on recycling right and offers only modest initiatives to achieve its waste diversion goal. I urge the County Board to ensure that the adopted plan:

• Acknowledge the climate impact of our waste disposal, including the greenhouse gas emissions from the embedded carbon of waste, and set ambitious targets for waste reduction.
• Include initiatives and waste reduction targets for County and APS operations that demonstrates the County’s commitment in the 2019 Zero Waste Resolution to lead by example.
• Set in motion efforts to better measure and track the large amounts of construction and demolition waste with the ultimate goal for promoting recycling and reuse of much of this material.

Sincerely,

NAME

ADDRESS

EMAIL ADDRESS

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This content originally appeared in The EcoAdvocate newsletter produced by the EcoAction Arlington Advocacy Committee.