Nunavik ramps up recycling, waste management projects

A group of high school students from Tarsakallak school in Aupaluk helped fill a container with used tires from the community’s landfill earlier this year, which were shipped south by sealift to be recycled. (PHOTO BY DOMINIC HAWLEY)

A poster advertises for an electronic recycling pilot program, which will launch in Kuujjuaq, Salluit and Kuujjuaraapik in 2015.

The Kativik Regional Government is starting to ramp up recycling projects across the region ahead of the launch of Nunavik’s new waste management plan.

The plan, currently undergoing its second revision, is set to be rolled out in late 2015.

But a number of the plan’s recycling projects are already taking place across Nunavik — and many of them are led by Nunavik youth, said Veronique Gilbert, an environmental specialist with the KRG.

The waste management plan’s focuses on redirecting hazardous waste to outside programs so this waste doesn’t end up in the local environment.

Among its measures: a recycling pilot project aimed at recycling electronics in the Nunavik communities of Kuujjuaq, Salluit and Kuujjuaraapik, which have run recycling projects in the past.

Starting in 2015, these three communities will have a recycling depot, which will look much like a large cage.

At the depots, set up in the local landfills, residents will be able to leave their old telephones, microwaves, photocopiers, televisions, computers and other end-of-life electronics.

In Quebec 2011 legislation requires companies that produce electronics to ensure these products are recycled after use.

While this hasn’t been the case so far in Nunavik, a Quebec organization called the Electronic Products Recycling Association is helping to support the pilot project in those three Nunavik communities, Gilbert said.

The association has committed to help launch the program and ship those used electronics south for recycling in the summer of 2015, she said.

“The idea is to introduce this in all the communities over the next three years,” Gilbert said. “But already around the region, pretty much all the communities have already sent some kind of hazardous waste south. So that’s very positive for the region.”

Other recycling projects, such as the collection of car batteries and oil barrels, have a longer history in Nunavik.

Over the past few years, Nunavik communities shipped 28 bulk bags of batteries south, with the costs picked up by a Quebec recycler.

In 2014, five communities shipped 190 used oil barrels south.

And since 2005, seven different communities have shipped 18 containers full of used tires south for recycling, thanks to a program paid for by an organization called Recyc-Québec.

Tires are collected by different groups, mostly on a volunteer basis — in Aupaluk, this past fall, a group of high school students volunteered to fill a container with tires.

“I presented it [the tire collection project] to the kids, and some agreed to help,” said Tarsakallak teacher Dominic Hawley. “It was a tough and dirty job as all the tires were filled with water and ice. We still managed to fill up an entire container to full capacity after four hours of hard and wet work.”

Although local municipal officers often oversee recycling projects, Gilbert said it’s important to target the region’s schools and youth to get projects off the ground.

“Education around recycling is at the centre of changing people’s habits. And it’s our youth who share with their parents and families what they’ve done,” said Gilbert, who previously taught at Kuujjuaq’s high school.

“It’s these kids who can have a positive impact on the environment going forward.”