Garbage Economics - Thursday, September 14, 2006

"Private-sector waste experts agree that any waste-diversion program is more costly than throwing garbage into a hole. Rob Cook, president of the Ontario Waste Management Association, says dumping, including transport costs and tipping fees, costs anywhere from $55 to $80 a tonne. Incinerating costs about $170 a tonne, while recycling can cost up to $200 a tonne."

I can not accept this statement, except that it is an attention-grabbing statement in a local newspaper.

I can't accept any figure on the dollar cost of an operation unless the statement is qualified with the basis or boundaries of the cost.

Maybe Rob Cook has been mis-quoted; there is a possibility that an editor cut out the qualification for economy of space (read: "to fit more advertising into a finite space").

None the less the public is being fed the idea that dumping is cheap.

• I don't believe that.

Dumping means putting into a hole in the ground something that has cost us money. That is putting Canada's gold into the ground, but not like Fort Knox USA whence it can be withdrawn at any time. Each toaster, shaped piece of wood and so on represents money that was earned and spent. That's gold. It is a nation's gold.

Boundaries: If a municipality asks a haulage contractor how much is to be paid per ton, the contractor may well reply "Eighty Dollars", and that is what we see here. Note that the contractor's business is carting stuff today, not shaping the future.

If we can not build on that garbage site, we have to build further out (perpetual commuter costs) or further up (perpetual crowding downtown).

If we have to dig it all up in twenty years, there's a cost to our children.

If we have to build another toaster or shape another piece of wood, there's a manufacturing cost to replace the original labor that now sits in a hole in the ground.

But the contractor is not asked to include these costs; these costs are outside the boundary of the question asked by the municipality.

I will bet that the cost of incineration includes a capital cost amortized over the life of the plant.

The cost of incineration ought to be little more than one paper match, if you want an extremely narrow boundary.

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