Reaching for Zero:
A The Citizens Plan for Zero Waste in New York City
By Resa Dimino and Barbara Warren
New York City Zero Waste Campaign
and Consumer Policy Institute / Consumers Union June 2004
available in pdf format

The success of waste prevention and recycling in New York City has been limited by inadequate information and analysis. Data gathering and research enable program managers to assess and evaluate zero waste programs. Continual evaluation and iteration of programs facilitates improved performance and increased waste diversion.

In some cases the City has functioned without basic information. The Local Law that required DSNY to conduct a commercial waste study that would determine how much commercial waste the City is actually producing, was a response to this lack of necessary information for solid waste planning. In some areas, like program costs, public information gaps remain. DSNY has changed the methods it uses from year to year, making it impossible for anyone to comprehensively evaluate costs and provide oversight. Research has too often been conducted without public input, adequate study design and methods, or appropriate sharing of findings in a timely fashion.

Valuable information and research, when completed, is frequently allowed to gather dust, rather than being used to provide feedback to programs and policy decisions. For example, Science Applications International Corporation completed a series of excellent reports on waste prevention for DSNY. One of these reports identifies millions of dollars in potential savings for City agencies–yet little follow-up has occurred to realize these savings (Science Applications International Corporation, NYC Sen$e, 2000). There is currently no mechanism that requires DSNY or other departments to report research findings or what they intend to do with them. The Mayor’s Management Report could be modified to fulfill this function.

Other sections of this report recommend that a variety of research and pilot projects be pursued to gain better information on everything from multi-family recycling to commercial waste. A listing of these projects is provided at the end of this chapter. In all cases, the cityCity should structure research and pilot projects so that they learn about, analyze, pilot test, and optimize options and strategies to determine how -- not whether -- to best implement zero waste programs.

To ensure that research is valuable and useful, it must address the following key elements:

• Research projects should be carefully designed to produce clear answers to research questions and identify paths to move forward, not simply to justify the cityCity’s preferred actions;
• Development and execution of such projects should involve key stakeholders and provide a means for public input when the study is being designed, and before it is finalized;
• Where appropriate, research projects should be performed by universities, consultants, not-for-profit institutions, and/or local businesses;
• All research projects and pilots should include peer review by academics and experts and should use scientific methods;
• Research projects and the information they generate must be completely transparent and available for public review;
• Research reports should include why the research was done, how it was done, all relevant findings, and agency or Mayoral recommendations arising from findings;
• All research findings should be used to improve effectiveness and incorporate lessons learned for better zero waste programs.
• Regular, recurring information needs should be addressed by consistent and transparent methods.

The cityCity’s next Solid Waste Management Plan in 2014, must a close look at its progress toward zero waste as required by the NYS Solid Waste Management Act. At that point, the City should consider what sectors and methods need to be addressed more aggressively to achieve zero waste in the decade that follows.

Key fundamental research and information needs include:

• Waste Characterization study: frequent and comprehensive analyses of the materials that are entering the waste stream, as well as what is being diverted by zero waste programs.
• Accurate, standardized data, that is publicly transparent and useful for implementing and evaluating all zero waste programs--including clear and decipherable information on cost and performance of various zero waste programs, as well as of waste disposal.
• Incremental Cost Analysis to ensure that programs are compared on their net costs, not gross costs, which can distort the real competitiveness of zero waste programs.
• Life Cycle Costing in Purchasing, so that products that cost more initially, but are more durable or longer lasting, can compete for cityCity contracts.

Waste Characterization Studies

The most critical piece of information to plan for a zero waste future is a detailed and accurate waste characterization study for all waste streams, including residential, institutional and commercial generators. The City must understand the composition of its waste. The waste characterization program described below will create a consistent flow of information on what material is in our waste stream and what is diverted, so that planners can evaluate the existing programs and design new programs to divert remaining materials. In effect, the program creates a feedback loop that allows the cityCity to constantly evaluate its progress toward zero waste, measuring success and improving diversion.

DSNY recently entered into a contract with a consulting firm, to produce a detailed waste characterization study of the residential and institutional sectors. Unfortunately, the recently completed commercial waste study focused on detailed characterization of this waste stream, but on facilities, operations and broad categories of waste. This leaves a large gap for any zero waste plan.

Any waste characterization study should identify materials that shouldn’t be present, like hazardous waste, as well as materials that the City could take steps to prevent from entering the waste stream. Durables, nondurables (including disposable items), preventables, reusables, recyclables, packaging, and compostables should all be identified by weight and volume. Products and packaging posing particular problems should simultaneously be identified as possible targets for Extender Producer Responsibility (EPR) legislation. Greater attention needs to be paid to quantifying various types of organics in the waste stream and identifying which are most suitable for recycling, e.g., scrap wood, and which would be best composted, e.g., food scraps.

To ensure that these analyses inform program planning and lead to increased diversion, the current waste characterization study, and any others, must be followed up on and confirmed through ongoing evaluations at the curb and at transfer stations. Frequent spot inspections in different districts, at institutions and transfer stations can provide valuable information about what is in the waste stream.. This was illustrated clearly when members of the public toured cityCity-owned marine transfer stations and found truck loads almost totally comprised of reusable furniture and recyclable cardboard being tipped into barges (Warren, 2000). Moreover, progress on zero waste will be fostered by engaging reuse, recycling, composting and prevention organizations to collect and report data on the materials they divert.

Full characterization studies addressing all streams (residential, institutional and commercial) and including many categories of preventable waste, reusables, recyclables and compostables should be performed every five years. These will be extremely valuable in program planning and evaluation by enabling the cityCity to determine how well it is capturing recyclable, reusable, durable and compostable materials, and how well it is preventing needless packaging and disposables. Characterization studies will also identify unanticipated new materials, products or packaging entering the waste stream. Future characterization studies should also address the toxic components in the waste stream and be used to develop strategies to eliminate them.

Implementation Schedule:

2005: Complete waste characterization study, including study of commercial waste.

2006-2008: Perform frequent spot checks to verify and update characterization data; gather diversion data from zero waste operations.

2009: Perform a full waste characterization study, including toxic components of the waste stream.

2010-2013: Perform frequent spot checks to verify and update characterization data; gather diversion data from zero waste operations.

2014: Perform a full waste characterization study.

2015: 2014 detailed waste composition analyses used to develop programs, regulation and legislation; Modifications to all programs in order to reach 2024 ZERO GOALS.

2015-2018: Perform frequent spot checks to verify and update characterization data; gather diversion data from zero waste operations.

2019: Perform a full waste characterization study; 2019 Waste composition analysis informs plans for final 5 years in order to reach ZERO WASTE

2020-2023: Perform frequent spot checks to verify and update characterization data; gather diversion data from zero waste operations.

2024: Perform a full waste characterization study.

Accurate, Standardized, Useful and Publicly Transparent Information

If we are to accomplish even interim goals toward a zero waste future, the City must develop consistent, accurate and reliable methods for gathering and reporting information to the public and elected officials. Over the years since the Recycling Law was passed in 1989, various reports and solid waste plans have included almost annual changes in basic methods of gathering and presenting information. This problem would not have occurred if the Waste Plan model for costs developed by the Tellus Institute, had not been subsequently abandoned after the 1992 Solid Waste Management Plan was completed (City of New York Department of Sanitation, 1992). If we had continued with Waste Plan, we would have a full decade of consistent cost information. In addition, the kinds of information we collect must be useful for developing, improving and evaluating all zero waste programs. For example, measurable outcomes must be developed for use in the Mayor’s Management Report. There should include outcomes not exclusively related to traditional solid waste handling, but also to market development for recyclable and reusable materials, such as the monetary value of goods transferred for reuse.

In addition to developing new information, planning for zero waste would be greatly enhanced by making more information that DSNY currently collects available and transparent. At the November 2002 Roundtable on the Future of Recycling in NYC, a panel of national experts was unable to provide detailed recommendations on how to improve the cost-effectiveness of recycling because little information was available, and much of what was available was contradictory, e.g., differing collection and program cost estimates from the City’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and DSNY (Center for Economic and Environmental Partnership, 2002). A new analysis by the City’s Independent Budget Office has added to the confusion regarding true costs of these programs (New York City Independent Budget Office, 2004).

To correct these problems, the City must provide detailed, accurate, and decipherable data to the public on the costs of all zero waste programs, including recycling, reuse, composting and waste prevention, as well as trash handling and disposal. Publicly available data for all zero waste programs should include, at a minimum:

• Regular Materials Markets Updates (what, where, who, how much capacity, etc.) for all reuse, recycling, remanufacture and other end user industries. This should include service voids, such as lack of composting capacity.
• The truck shift costs (labor, maintenance, etc) for collection and transportation.
• The "relay" costs, or the labor and transportation costs, of transporting waste and recyclables to long-distance facilities, such as transfer stations and incinerators in New Jersey.
• An accounting of overtime expenses allocated to different programs.
• Detailed Information on truck routes, including kinds and amounts of materials collected and types of trucks used on particular routes.
• Information on collection efficiencies (i.e., how full the trucks are at the end of a route) and compaction rates, etc.
• Direct collection costs per ton and by volume for waste and recycling (with no overtime included here, since overtime is a management decision).
• Total debt service and administrative costs and how they are allocated to different programs.
• Disposal and/or processing costs per ton.
• Revenues received from recyclable materials.
• Total waste cumulatively prevented through waste prevention from previous years (where quantifiable) should be included in the evaluation of relative costs of zero waste programs vs. trash disposal. For example the NYCHA Leave it on the Lawn program continues to benefit the City year after year and those benefits and savings should be captured in any economic analysis performed.

Only with this level of data can advocates, consultants, experts, and elected officials offer valuable insight on how to contain costs and enhance efficiencies. Furthermore, this information will provide more specific indicators of participation rates, capture rates, and other important data that can be used to identify low-performing neighborhoods and design appropriate education, enforcement, and other measures to improve performance.

Implementation Schedule:

2005: Identify information needs, standardized methods and useful milestones to be used for regular reporting on progress toward zero waste: include strong public participation in this effort.

2006 and beyond: Provide regular reporting of accurate, standardized, useful and publicly transparent information through various venues. Annually release detailed and decipherable data on program costs and performance.

Incremental Cost Analysis/Full Cost Accounting

The US Environmental Protection Agency recommends a method for full cost accounting that is based on incremental costs (Government Finance Officers Assoc. & US Environmental Protection Agency, 2000). The federal agency encourages states and municipalities to use the same accounting method so that costs for various cities and states can be compared. Incremental cost analysis is generally accepted in the national arena as a fair and accurate way to compare different solid waste management options. These methods measure a program’s total direct expenses against the savings realized in other operations as a result of the program, to arrive at a net cost. The cityCity should compare zero waste programs to solid waste handling on an incremental cost basis, not based on fully loaded costs, as is the current practice.

For example, an incremental cost analysis of the recycling program would consider direct recycling collection and processing costs, as well as disposal cost savings resulting from diversion and revenues from the sale of recyclable materials, to derive a net cost of the recycling program. The City should deal primarily with direct costs and savings when evaluating zero waste programs. This would avoid the year to year inconsistent methods that have also allowed a greater proportion of debt service, administrative and solid waste planning costs to be "assigned" to the recycling program.

One major problem with the comparative analysis of curbside recycling vs. waste collection and disposal costs is that it fails to account for waste prevention activities already implemented, but costing nothing today. For example, the New York Housing Authority (NYCHA). Leave It on the Lawn program continues to divert 8,000-15,000 tons of grass clippings annually from the waste stream (City of New York Department of Sanitation, 2001). As we move toward a Zero Waste future, we should be accounting for all zero waste program benefits that can be quantified, not just curbside recycling. A similar situation relates to the separate containerized recycling program — costs on this program are no longer supplied to us. Yet DSNY reported in the early 1990s that containerized recycling was much less costly than curbside. Such lack of reporting means that we cannot take advantage of what could be much more cost-effective collection systems. The City should conduct incremental cost analysis for the combination of all zero waste programs vs. waste collection and disposal. Failing to properly account for such benefits means that waste prevention will continue to be underfunded.

Furthermore, the Mayor’s Management Report and other reporting tools should make use of the standardized EPA methods and add comparisons to the performance of other cities.

Implementation Schedule:

2004 and beyond: Utilize EPA full cost accounting methodology to determine incremental cost of all zero waste programs combined.

Life Cycle Costing in Purchasing

Procurement of environmentally preferable products would be enhanced by the use of life-cycle costing. That is, the purchaser analyzes a product’s value not only on the upfront costs, but also on its costs over the entire life cycle. This method ensures that durable and longer lasting products are more competitive than disposable and more wasteful products. New York State adopted a life-cycle costing requirement for state agency purchases in 2000 (New York State Laws of 2000). The City’s consultant, SAIC, also looked at life cycle costing analysis (Science Applications International Corporation, Life Span Costing Analysis Case Studies, 2000).

Implementation Schedule:

2005: Establish life-cycle costing policy for agency purchasing.

Recommended Research and Pilot Projects

The City should pursue research projects including, but not limited to, the following:

Chapter 1: Waste Prevention

• Develop specifications and identify environmentally preferable products for City purchases for a product guide and website;
• Assess current City agency purchases of hazardous materials and recommend safer alternatives where feasible; hire two coordinators to promote the program to City agency purchasers (one coordinator would have specific expertise in toxics).
• Complete waste audits that identify current agency and institutional practices regarding waste and purchasing and opportunities for improvements.
• Gather information, pilot test and survey to address research and information needs identified by various waste prevention coordinators in the Waste Prevention chapter–schools, HHC, etc.
• Study the feasibility of installing dishwashing systems and using reusable dishes or transitioning to the use of compostable service ware where dishwashing is not feasible in agency and institutional cafeterias.

Chapter 2: Reuse

• Better understand the existing network of reuse businesses in NYC.
• Pilot collection of durables that preserves quality of goods collected and evaluate best scheduling frequency.
• Develop "Seal of Approval" for reusable goods.

Chapter 3: Recycling

• Support market development efforts.
• Improve recycling collections efficiency and cost-effectiveness by testing various compaction ratios for impacts on efficiency, quality and marketability of materials, by testing single stream collection, and by testing new routes and truck technologies.
• Evaluate and pilot test different options for public space recycling and develop an implementation strategy.
• Identify the best methods of improving multi-family recycling in different housing stocks and pilot test and implement improved programs and strategies.
• Identify and pilot test incentives for City agencies, such as shared revenue/shared savings models used at the federal level.
• Identify and correct problems with commercial recycling.
• Study and pilot test alternative means of increasing the availability of special waste (i.e., household hazardous waste) collections.

Chapter 4: Composting

Pilot test and implement methods to decrease collection costs for the Christmas tree program.

• Pilot test options and develop an implementation strategy for expanding yard debris collections to the spring and summer seasons.
• Identify the best composting technologies.
• Determine the capacity needs and operational issues of food scrap composting facilities.
• Pilot test source separated organics collection and mixed waste composting collections, including impacts on compost quality and collection costs, and develop an organics collection implementation strategy. Examine the impact of locking bins to control rats. Include an evaluation of the success and possible expansion of organics drop-offs.

Chapter 5: Economic Development

• Develop model program for NYC with adequate staffing and financial resources
• Provide multiple services in one place- a "virtual industrial park"
• Develop traditional industrial parks housing various complementary zero waste businesses.

Chapter 6: Education

• Evaluate all educational programs and provide feedback. Include consumer opinion research on public perceptions of reuse, recycling, waste prevention, and composting to inform zero waste programs and campaigns; and university-based educational research- to evaluate success of targeted campaigns and identify barriers to public participation.
• Block Leader/Building Leader Program: to pilot test strategies for recruiting and utilizing zero waste education volunteers.
• Evaluate success of consumer campaigns and modify accordingly.

Chapter 7: Enforcement

• Evaluate whether enforcement efforts are achieving desired results in terms of modifying behaviors, particularly at agencies and institutions and multifamily dwellings.

Chapter 8: Transportation

• Make the municipal collection system more efficient and cost-effective through better routing and collection frequency adjustments.
• Pilot test and develop an implementation strategy for commercial collection franchise districts.
• Identify the most viable clean vehicle/fuel options for DSNY fleets, private carter fleets, and marine vessels and develop implementation strategies for each sector.
• Evaluate the feasibility of using existing and proposed rail lines to transport reusables, recyclables and compostables and, if feasible, develop an implementation strategy.
• Pilot test biodiesel in DSNY and MTA fleets and to evaluate the feasibility of a biodiesel production facility in the City; if feasible, develop a strategy to attract a biodiesel production facility.
• Evaluate truck design options for varying for composting, reuse or recycling collection needs.

Chapter 9: Financing

• Pilot test possible Pay As Your Throw (PAYT) systems for different housing stocks and develop implementation strategies targeting each type of housing (i.e., 1-4 family, small multi-family and high rise).
• Evaluate potential for commercial waste franchise districts and appropriate fees.
• Evaluate potential for establishing fees for service.

Chapter 10: Legislation and Regulation

• Assess current government purchasing patterns and contracts; assess purchase of toxic chemicals.
• Evaluate Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) efforts in other jurisdictions and develop legislation.
• Review policies and regulations (including building codes) related to the disposition, purchase or use of reused materials to identify and eliminate barriers to increased reuse.
• Support legislative and regulatory efforts as needed.

References

Center for Economic and Environmental Partnership. 2002. Making Recycling Work: A Roundtable on the Future of Recycling in NYC. Roundtable Proceedings Report.

City of New York Department of Sanitation. 1992. Comprehensive Solid Waste Management Plan for NYC.

Government Finance Officers Association & US Environmental Protection Agency. 2000. Full Cost Accounting: Practical Guide on Converting to Full Cost Accounting.

New York City Independent Budget Office (IBO). 2004. Fiscal Brief: Refuse and Recycling: Comparing the Costs. February 2004.

New York State Laws of 2000. Chapter 95: Prioritizing of the Purchases of Remanufactured Commodities Through the State Procurement Process. Information provided for by the New York State Assembly Commission.

Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). 2000. NYC Sen$e Summary Report.

Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). 2000. Life Span Costing Analysis Case Studies.