The cost of waste management across the Argenteuil territory is close to $2.8 million per year, of which landfill disposal accounts for 59%. Most of Argenteuil’s municipalities send more waste for disposal than the average elsewhere in Québec. Almost 60% of the waste we generate is still sent to the landfill, and 34% of this waste is organic matter that could be otherwise composted or recycled.
Making all stakeholders responsible for waste management, reducing landfill waste, recycling or reclaiming as many materials as possible and innovating to find new opportunities are the objectives targeted by the MRC d’Argenteuil’s 2016-2020 Waste Management Plan (PGMR 2016-2020). To that end, thirty-six measures have been identified and detailed.
Consult the MRC d’Argenteuil’s 2016-2020 Waste Management Plan (in French)
The fundamental goal is for only ultimate waste to be sent for disposal. To achieve this goal, Argenteuil has set the following quantitative goals for 2020:
- Reduce the quantity of waste sent for disposal per capita by 15%, across all sectors. Each municipality has a specific objective according to its own reality (PGMR 2016-2020, page 98)
- For the residential sector only, a 17% reduction in landfill waste is targeted at this time per occupancy unit in order to account for the seasonal population, which is not included in the statistics, but which can pose a significant challenge for municipalities that receive a large number of vacationers (PGMR 2016-2020, page 99);
- Recycle 70% of paper, cardboard, plastic, glass and metal waste;
- Process 60% of organic household waste;
- Recycle or reclaim 80% of concrete, brick and asphalt waste;
- Sort at the source or send to a sorting centre 70% of construction, renovation and demolition waste from the building sector.
The plan also includes banning all organic materials in landfills as of 2020.