Minnesota accepting applications for recycling, composting grant funding

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency will distribute about $1 million in grant funding to cities and communities across the state next year.

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The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) is accepting applications for grant funding to help expand or improve recycling and composting programs across the state.

According to a news release from MPCA, the agency plans to award about $1 million to help counties, cities, townships or tribal communities reduce the amount of waste entering landfills by establishing best practices to reuse more materials and make recycling or composting programs more efficient and effective. MPCA says the proposals for these grants must include projects that are locally administered, have an educational component with measurable outcomes and include one or more of the following elements:

  • establish curbside recycling or composting;
  • increase recycling or composting;
  • reduce the amount of recyclable materials entering disposal facilities; or
  • reduce the costs associated with hauling waste by locating collection sites as close as possible to the site where waste is generated.

MPCA says preferred projects will focus on implementing or expanding local capacity to improve the collection of traditional recyclables, improving the quality of recyclables, transitioning to single-stream recycling collection and establishing or expanding reusing materials in their original form. Grants may also help establish or expand organics collection and the processing or transfer capacity for source-separated organic materials or develop and expand programs for hard-to-recycle and bulky materials, such as mattresses, concrete, shingles or electronic scrap.

The maximum grant award will be $250,000 per project, and applicants must match at least 25 percent of the grant award, according to MPCA. Additionally, for city applicants, the city’s population must be less than 45,000. Applications are due by 2 p.m. CT Jan. 11, 2022.

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