Chicago Expanding its Pilot Recycling Program

The city of Chicago will be expanding a pilot curbside recycling program that began in part of a ward in the south side of Chicago last year.

The Beverly ward reported a recycling participation rate of around 80 percent, a figure that the city hopes to replicate as it expands the new program to seven additional wards by next year. The city has a total of 50 wards in the city.

The announcement to expand the program was announced as part of Chicago Mayor Daley’s budget speech, given earlier this week.

Meanwhile, the city will continue to use its often criticized blue bag collection program throughout the rest of the city. This program has only garnered a more modest 13 percent participation rate. Critics of this plan also note that the bags of recyclables, which were tossed into trucks with the trash pickup, ended up with much higher contamination levels due to the breaking of bags and the mixing of waste with the recyclables.

While the city will be adding seven more wards to the new program, Mayor Daley has not announced which wards they would be or when they would be added.

The pilot program uses a 96-gallon container instead of a bag. Also, material collected is delivered to Resource Management, Chicago Ridge, which charges the city a processing fee, with the city earning some recycling revenue.

Collection also will take place twice a month, rather than weekly, and the program is single-stream, with all the recyclables placed in the container.