Recycling up 8% on the island | News | postguam.com - The Guam Daily Post
Recycling up 8% on the island | News | postguam.com
Recycling on Guam is up despite taking a little dip during the pandemic, according to the Guam Environmental Protection Agency
“As you may recall, in 2011, the first reported recycling rate was 17.85% of all eligible waste. So that means that everything discarded that was reported by Solid Waste Management facilities yielded a 17.85% reduction from the landfill. Today we are happy to bounce back, especially from the days of the pandemic where our recycling rate did take a dip into the 20s. But today we're happy to report that we are at 38.2% which represents (an) 8.99% point increase from last year's reported rate,” said Guam EPA acting Administrator Nic Rupley Lee.
On Monday, Guam EPA celebrated America Recycles Day with a proclamation signing declaring the week of Nov. 13 through Nov. 17 as Guam Recycles week.
Lee attributed the increase to educational outreach efforts and support from both private and public sectors and the governor’s administration in promoting literacy and conservation resources.
“So that we become more mindful of our resource consumption and our responsibility to use our resources more productively. I think it goes without saying that we don't have to wait for this occasion to partake in recycling,” Lee said.
Recycling is a daily effort that everyone should partake in, said Lee, by following a few simple steps to manage waste.
“Typically, you want to think about the items that you can recycle, make sure that they're dry and clean and place them in the proper bin. By doing that, even in our small part of the world, we could do our part to reduce what goes in the landfill, reduce our greenhouse gases and sustain our environment,” Lee said.
Acting Gov. Josh Tenorio, stressed that, with land resources limited on Guam, recycling is crucial.
“The compelling situation we find ourselves since we only have 212 square miles on this island and not much acreage assigned to the solid waste activities and recycling activities that we need to enable in order for us to maximize and prioritize land use for the people of Guam and to make sure that their quality of life is improved,” Tenorio said.
The acting governor spoke of initiatives future and present to manage the different waste streams on the island, one of which is the issue of abandoned vehicles.
“There's going to be an opportunity for some progress soon with Sen. Sabina Perez’s legislation that, in tandem with our administration, is going to make improvements to the way that we deal with one of the waste streams on the island, which is abandoned vehicles and junk vehicles - and making it easier for us to recycle this part of the waste stream a bit more faster - in line with what our public is looking for,” Tenorio said.
In the year to come, Tenorio is hopeful that progress is made in dealing with single-use plastics.
“It’s not a very simple topic to deal with in terms of the manufacturing that occurs, but I'm a proponent of having the government take an active role in enabling the private sector to identify technologies and perhaps make investments in facility and equipment so that we can add on more items from the waste stream and recover them for a wider reuse,” Tenorio said.