Arctic Co-ops gets funding from related insurance firm for can-crusher

The Arctic Co-operatives Ltd. Nunavut pop can recycling program got a boost from Ontario-based The Co-operators Group Ltd., which contributed $26,000 for a can-crusher at an unloading depot in southern Canada. The equipment will cut the cost of transport from the depot to recycling plants in the south by about 85 per cent. (FILE PHOTO)

Nunavut’s only large-scale pop-can recycling program, run by Arctic Co-operatives Ltd., got an added boost from the Co-operators Group Ltd., Nov. 27, when it announced a contribution of $26,000 for a can-crusher to cut transportation costs.

The crusher will be located at a depot near the port of Ste-Catherine, Quebec, where cans shipped out of the territory are received and transported to a recycler.

“By crushing, we’re going to be able to reduce the cost of road transportation (to recyclers) in the South,” said Duane Wilson, vice-president of merchandising and logistics for Arctic Co-operatives Ltd.

“Now we’ll be able to crush them at probably a six-to-one ratio, to reduce the road transportation costs by 85 per cent,” he said.

The added savings help ensure the ACL’s program will not operate at a loss, Wilson said.

“We’re a member-run organization, and this is not a money-making endeavour. This is about doing the right thing for the environment and for the communities that we serve and I’ve got a responsibility to ensure that it’s not costing anything to do this in Nunavut.”

The ACL runs the recycling program in 24 of Nunavut’s 25 communities. The co-operative network pays for the program through a 10-cent charge on plastic bags.

As an added incentive,the ACL started a program in 2011 that offers $1,500 to community-oriented non-profit groups who can fill a sealift container with aluminum cans.

The Ontario-based Co-operators Group, which is partly ACL-owned, helped start the recycling program with a $40,000 donation in 2011.

“Arctic Co-operatives came up with the idea to introduce this recycling program,” said Leonard Sharman, media relations advisor for the Co-operators, a nation-wide insurance company owned by co-ops. “We thought it was a great idea, because it’s the last territory to get a recycling program.”

The Arctic Co-ops’ program is also the only immediate option Nunavummiut have to keep pop cans out of the territory’s landfills.

That’s after the Government of Nunavut concluded in 2010 that it could not run a territory-wide recycling program, leaving the field open for ACL.

“The co-op system has its own fleet of containers and has the support of Nunavut Sealink and Supply,” which makes the program possible, Wilson said.

Wilson hinted that the territorial government may become involved in recycling again, by helping fund the ACL’s effort.

“We have a verbal commitment on the part of the Department of Environment, and Community and Government Services on a combined basis to match the Co-operators’ contribution,” Wilson said.

The addition of can-crushing equipment will allow the ACL to recycle up to two million cans per year, and “donate more from the recycling program to local community groups,” the ACL stated in a Nov. 27 news release.

Since the program’s start in 2011, “19 sea containers containing approximately 750,000 cans have been shipped out the territory to be recycled,” the ACL release said.