zero waste zone

 Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone Demonstration Project October 10, 2013 I. SUMMARY/ABSTRACT The Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone Demonstration Project proposes to address the issue of overflowing trash dumpsters in business districts across Philadelphia that attract vermin, repel pedestrians with unpleasant odors and in general threaten the vitality of nearby businesses. Using the businesses surrounding the 1300 block of Drury Street as a model, this project seeks to demonstrate to business districts across the City how single-­‐establishment trash and recycling programs can be consolidated into multi-­‐establishment “recycling centers.” Each are designed to divert more than 90% of waste generated to recycling and composting operations, rather than to landfills and incinerators at a competitive cost to current waste disposal fees. Furthermore, the project will employ a living “green wall” and other methods to create green cityscapes to cloak waste management operations and create an eco-­‐friendly setting that enhances economic activity and the quality of life. II. NEED STATEMENT Trash dumpsters litter the narrow streets, sidewalks and back alleys of Center City Philadelphia and many business districts. They attract vermin, smell bad, are unsightly and make dozens of neighborhoods unpleasant to navigate by the people who work, live in or visit Philadelphia. Wherever they are, they threaten the vitality of businesses nearby. The conditions on the 1300 block of Drury Street, in the Midtown Village business district of Philadelphia, are a case in point. Up to eighteen dumpsters have shared the narrow street with McGillin’s Olde Ale House, serving the waste disposal needs of the establishments from the three surrounding blocks. Unsightly, with frequently overflowing containers, the whole street reeks in the summer heat, attracting rodents and forcing McGillin’s, at its own expense, to power wash and provide extermination for the entire street to maintain its clientele. This situation has become intolerable and unacceptable, not only for the owners of McGillin’s, but also for the managers of the neighboring establishments. Consequently, they have agreed to work together to become Philadelphia’s first Several dumpsters and trash carts on Drury Street Zero Waste Zone, consolidating their trash and recycling programs into a single ‘recycling center,’ together with composting. What is needed is to assure that the efforts of the 1300 block of Drury Street succeed as a replicable model available to the business districts and neighborhoods across Philadelphia. III. THE SOLUTION Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 2 of 10 October 2013 The Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone Project is the proposed solution to meet this need: a shared waste management The waste audit at McGillin’s Olde system with green improvements and technical support to the Ale House has already provided participating restaurants and businesses to re-­‐direct 90 critical information of percent or more of all generated waste to recycling and representative restaurant/bars in composting. Zero Waste Zones are conceived to be voluntary, the neighborhood. with merchant-­‐selected business districts, and establishments • Current recyclables diversion = committed to becoming zero-­‐waste establishments consistent 43.5% with the Planning Group of the Zero Waste International 1
• Organics/compostables = Alliance. 45.5% • Potential Diversion Rate The heart of a Zero Waste Zone is the recycling center: the consolidation of trash and recycling services of participating (Organics +Recyclables) = 89% establishments. This system provides a managed system of Achieving ‘zero waste’ requires a dedicated containers for recyclables, compostable material minimum of 90% diversion away and trash. Modeled after the Moravian Court Recycling Facility from landfills and incineration. in West Philadelphia, this approach has been successful in McGillin’s will be able to achieve accommodating 22 businesses in a single location since 2004 this with minimal changes to its and in its current configuration since 2012. The major issue operation. addressed by the system at Moravian Court was odor and vermin. Food waste – the culprit in most trash-­‐related Most of the neighboring businesses problems – is kept separate from dry trash and deposited into have similar waste composition. a special container called a “BiobiN” designed to completely eliminate odor and prevent access to vermin. Available in sizes from 3 to 25 yards, shared BiobiN’s can be sized to fit the setting. Instead of a street lined with dumpsters, Drury Street will have three receptacles: a BiobiN and receptacles for trash and recycling. Consolidation will dramatically reduce the number of trash/recycling pick-­‐ups and the design of the layout includes a living “green wall” to hide waste equipment operations behind a visually-­‐
pleasing barrier. This will create the potential for a trendy cityscape, either a pedestrian thoroughfare and/or an outdoor seating plaza. In addition to these direct benefits accruing to the neighborhood, there are substantial environmental and economic advantages to this program as well. The Zero Waste Zone will create an eco-­‐friendly setting that enhances economic activity and the quality of life in Midtown Village. Greenhouse gas emissions will be reduced because food waste sent to landfills generates large quantities of methane, a particularly potent contributor to the atmospheric gases responsible for climate change. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), organic waste in our landfills is the number one source of man-­‐made methane in the United States. Since most of the participating retailers are restaurants and bars, it is likely that upwards of 45% of the waste generated in the Drury Street neighborhood is food waste. The third and critical aspect of the Zero Waste Zone will be technical assistance. This will include waste audits, staff orientation and periodic re-­‐orientation, and in-­‐house support to operating practices, and slightly modified purchasing decisions (such as replacing disposable plastic soufflé cups with either 1
See: http://www.zwia.org/ -­‐ select "standards", then "principles" Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 3 of 10 October 2013 89% compostable or reusable metal ones). McGillin’s Olde Ale House is now diverting approximately 90% of its waste to recycling and composting. The Zero Waste Zone program, scaled to each circumstance, would include similar steps in any business district or isolated alley or backstreet where it is implemented. This proposal will explore the details to establish the Drury Street Recycling Center and Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone as a model for replication. The current model of commercial waste management and collection in Philadelphia is not efficient economically, environmentally or in terms of public health and safety. This demonstration is intended to show an alternative way of storing and collecting waste that will create new commercial opportunities for the private sector, identify gaps in public policy that need to be addressed and generate interest from business owners in seeking more effective methods of handling waste. IV. MIDTOWN VILLAGE ZERO WASTE ZONE: BACKGROUND The project began in the summer of 2012, when McGillin’s retained Niche Recycling, Inc. to investigate options to solve the chronic problems it was experiencing with trash on Drury Street. Niche interviewed most of the business owners and managers along 13th, Sansom and Chestnut Streets which use Drury Street for storing their trash. They estimated the volume of waste being generated by the businesses and their costs of waste disposal. They also met with representatives of Center City District, Washington West Civic Association, Midtown Village Merchants Association, Penn Future, members of City Council and the Philadelphia Streets Department. Goldman Properties, the landlord for many of the businesses and owner of a parking lot on Drury Street, was included in conversations about utilizing their parking lot to house the waste system. Finally, a community meeting was held to present and discuss the Zero Waste Zone project and obtain feedback on the preliminary concept. There was very positive reaction to the presentation. Drury Street Rendering with Zero Waste Zone Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project In early 2013 McGillin’s decided to lead by example. McGillin’s began changing their purchasing to reduce the quantity of material that needed to be put in the trash. Several disposal items were replaced with reusable or compostable ones. Niche Recycling conducted a waste audit over a 3-­‐
day period in February. Complete by St. Patrick’s Day, the process and results of the audit established a program and composting collection service for their food waste. McGillin’s demonstrated that with limited technical assistance, staff Page 4 of 10 October 2013 training and changes in commodities purchases and operations procedures, the in-­‐house efforts to divert 90% to composting and recycling could be achieved. They also discovered single-­‐establishment collection options for food waste to be limited to 65 gallon “toter” carts. Less than odor free, this approach would also increase the number containers if each of the business owners instituted their own composting collection service, adding to the problems on Drury Street. The smaller, 3 cubic yard BiobiNs would serve this need, but currently there are no vendors available to provide collection services. At present, the shared solution in place at Moravian Court (with larger BiobiNs which are picked up, the contents delivered to a composting facility and then the container is returned to the site) is practical to assure odor and vermin control and the opportunity to improve the aesthetics of the block. Beyond Drury Street, support to develop a small BiobiN collection network will become important to service the alleys and backstreets of Center City and many of the City’s business districts. Proposed shared collection with BiobiN composting unit on left; recycling and trash containers on right V. MIDTOWN VILLAGE ZERO WASTE ZONE DEMONSTRATON PROJECT: IMPLEMENTATION PLAN This demonstration project will be developed in four phases. There is a pre-­‐project development period (Phase I), site and participant preparation period (Phase II), implementation period (Phase III) and Green City Scape (Phase IV). Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 5 of 10 October 2013 PHASE I – PRE-­‐PROJECT DEVELOPMENT 1. Create the Management Administrative Group (MAG) for the project. An administrative and legal structure must be in place in order for the project to succeed. Niche Recycling will work with the participating businesses to create a legal management entity that can then be authorized to make decisions and implement the project. 2. Secure project funding. This project requires funding for capital, start-­‐up costs and ongoing implementation. See budget section for detailed information. Niche Recycling will work with project leadership to identity and secure funding. PHASE II – SITE & PARTICIPANT PREPARATIONS This phase includes preparations for the site and participants. Activities will include: 1. Training each business how to separate waste. In order to conduct a waste audit (see #2 below), management and staff at each participating business must be trained on proper separation of materials. In addition to allowing for an accurate audit, this also is the beginning of the process for incorporating separate collection of compostable material and single stream recycling. 2. Conducting waste audits for participating businesses. This is an essential step so the system can be sized accurately. The assumptions about waste volume and its composition incorporated into the equipment and hauling budget are based on interviews with the establishments’ management that took place during the feasibility phase of the project in 2012 and spot checking of dumpsters several years ago. While these estimates are good for initial planning, they must be refined and confirmed before the plan is finalized. 3. Finalize system and site design based on audit results. The size of each equipment type (compost, recycling, trash) and frequency of collection are finalized with the waste audit results. 4. Establish contracts with all participating parties. The Management Administrative Group (MAG) will have several important functions including entering into a lease for the parking lot where the equipment will be housed and signing agreements with participating businesses. 5. Ensure there is public policy in place to prevent new dumpsters from being sited on the street. Work with Streets Department and City Council to designate areas as Zero Waste Zones and ensure dumpster placement must be approved by Zone leadership giving priority to shared and high diversion rate methods. PHASE III – PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION This phase includes all the activities related to operation of the Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone. 1. Make site improvements. This includes bringing electricity and water to the site and re-­‐grading the pavement to support the equipment and provide proper drainage. 2. Purchase and install equipment. 3. Secure contract(s) to remove. compostables, recyclables and trash. 4. Conduct training and orientation at each business on how to separate compostable and recyclable material from trash. This will be follow-­‐up to the training conducted in preparation for the waste audit. Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 6 of 10 October 2013 5. Hire “porter” to oversee site activities. An important component of this program is someone to manage the waste going into each receptacle to ensure quality assurance, provide ongoing technical assistance and site management. 6. Documentation of demonstration results for replication. As a demonstration project, excellent record-­‐keeping and documentation is necessary to determine if and how the project should be replicated. PHASE IV– GREEN CITY SCAPE This Phase of the project focus on the design and implementation of Drury Street green cityscape 1. One objective of this project is to make Drury Street a model for Center City walk-­‐ability and improved aesthetics; it is not currently included in the budget of the project. MAG will work with its partners and collaborators to develop this aspect of the project. 2. Secure support for the design and budget for Drury Street green cityscape. 3. Secure funding to implement Drury Street green cityscape 4. Implement Drury Street green cityscape V. PARTNERS/COLLABORATORS • Center City District • Goldman Properties • Midtown Village Merchants Association • Niche Recycling • Penn Future • Pennsylvania Horticultural Society • Washington West Civic Association Businesses currently keeping waste receptacles on Drury Street and which have indicated interest in participating •
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Barbuzzo Bru Craft & Wurst The Corner Goldman Properties Greenhouse I. Goldberg Lolita McGillin's Olde Ale House Opa Mitch-­‐Gold Luxe Home Time Verde Yogurt City Zavino Zio’s Pizza Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 7 of 10 October 2013 V. PRO-­‐FORMA Funding for this project is sought as a combination of grants and loans, here proposed as a $50,000 grant and loan of $122,800, financed at 5.5% over five years as noted in the Pro-­‐Forma Income Statement below. Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 8 of 10 October 2013 Midtown Village Zero Waste Zone Pro-­‐Forma Income Statement (Projected) REVENUE Year 1 Gross revenue
Year 3 Year 4 Year 5 $116,886
$131,987
$142,086
$152,993
$164,772
0
0
0
0
0
$116,886
$131,987
$142,086
$152,993
$164,772
$116,886
$131,987
$142,086
$152,993
$164,772
$12,816
$13,841
$14,949
$16,144
$17,436
$12,816
$13,841
$14,949
$16,144
$17,436
$36,480
$37,574
$38,702
$39,863
$41,059
Less returns and
allowances
Net revenue
Year 2 COST OF REVENUE Gross Profit (Loss)
OPERATING EXPENSES Hauling Service
Total General/Administrative Salaries and wages
Employee benefits
$0
$0
$0
$0
$0
$774
$797
$821
$846
$871
Insurance
$4,200
$4,200
$4,200
$4,200
$4,200
Site Lease
Payroll taxes
$15,600
$15,600
$15,600
$15,600
$15,600
Utilities
Depreciation &
amortization
$900
$927
$955
$983
$1,013
$0
$0
$0
$0
$0
Office Admin
$900
$927
$955
$983
$1,013
$0
$0
$0
$0
$0
Travel & entertainment
Licenses
$200
$0
$0
$0
$0
Legal & Accounting
$1,125
$1,125
$1,125
$1,125
$1,125
Cleaning Supplies
$2,400
$2,472
$2,546
$2,623
$2,701
Interest
$6,294
$5,040
$3,715
$2,315
$834
Miscellaneous Expense
$6,000
$6,180
6,365
$6,556
$6,753
Total General/Administrative Expenses $74,872
$74,843
$74,984
$75,094
$75,168
Total Operating Expenses $87,688
$88,684
$89,933
$91,238
$92,604
$29,198
$43,303
$52,153
$61,755
$72,168
0
0
0
0
0
$29,198
$43,303
$52,153
$61,755
$72,168
$0
$0
$0
$0
$0
0
0
12
0
0
$29,198
$43,303
$52,141
$61,755
$72,168
Net Income Before Taxes Taxes on income
Net Income After Taxes
Extraordinary gain or loss
Income tax on extraordinary
gain
NET INCOME (LOSS) Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 9 of 10 October 2013 For more information, contact Christopher Mullins Jr., McGillin’s Olde Ale House, (215) 735-­‐5562 or Maurice Sampson, Niche Recycling, (267) 269-­‐6912, MSampson@nicherecycling.com. Midtown Village Zero Waste Demonstration Project Page 10 of 10 October 2013