Following the lead of several other cities and counties in California, officials of Butte County, Calif., have drafted a construction and demolition recycling ordinance, according to a report in the Mercury-Register (Oroville, Calif.).
The proposed ordinance would make C&D recycling mandatory for construction or demolition projects larger than 10,000 square feet or that generate 1,000 cubic yards of debris or more, according to the report.
Violators could be subject to fines up to $500 per incident.
According to local media reports, several cities in California’s Contra Costa County have either enacted similar ordinances or have introduced them. In addition, San Diego created a mandatory C&D recycling program in September 2005.
Many of California’s cities and counties are turning to C&D recycling to boost overall recycling rates to meet the state-mandated standard of a 50-percent recycling rate. Cities that fail to meet that standard could face hefty fines from the state of up to $10,000 per day.