Waste Board Contracts With Humboldt County for Rural Recycling Markets

SACRAMENTO—In the future, many rural areas throughout California could substantially increase waste diversion and have their own manufactured recycled-content products available on-line for Internet shoppers to take advantage of.

Thanks to an 18-month, $60,000 contract approved by the California Integrated Waste Management Board today, Humboldt County has been chosen to develop a Recycling Market Development Zone (RMDZ) "business incubator" that minimizes many of the risks and expenses commonly associated with start-up recycling ventures. Humboldt County was chosen because it has an active RMDZ, existing business incubators that until now have used only virgin resources, a rural environment, available workforce, and represented the greatest leverage of Board funds and revenues for such a project.

The county will use the money to study ways to divert recyclable materials from landfills, provide office space and technical services to expand waste diversion in non-metropolitan areas, and make recycled-content products available for consumers on-line. Ultimately, successful recycling operations will leave the "incubator," establish their own businesses and enhance diversion of materials from landfills by rural jurisdictions. Some businesses may eventually manufacture products that enable consumers and other businesses to "close the recycling loop" on purchases with recycled-content goods.

The Waste Board contract with Humboldt County will help determine whether establishing rural-based "business incubators" to increase diversion for materials like textiles, plastic, glass, and household furniture and electronics is feasible. If successful, the Waste Board hopes to see projects like Humboldt County's replicated in other rural regions around California.

"California's rural regions can play important roles when it comes to reducing and recycling wastes," said Waste Board Chairman Dan Eaton. "Rural areas face unique problems when it comes to recycling and getting the collected materials to companies that can use them. Programs such as this one can help overcome these obstacles."

The Humboldt County Waste Board project ties in with legislation signed last year by Governor Davis that champions economic rural programs to ensure unincorporated areas aren't left behind in the wake of California's booming urban expansion and development by stressing economic incentives and increasing rural manufacturing and export capabilities.

Humboldt County will report quarterly to the Waste Board on the project's progress. Products manufactured in the incubators may be included in the Recyclestore Project, an Internet outlet that makes recycled-content items available nationwide to environmentally conscientious "green" shoppers on-line. The web site is www.recyclestore.com.

The six-member Integrated Waste Management Board is responsible for protecting the public's health and safety and the environment through management of the estimated 56 million tons of solid waste generated in California each year. The Board's mandate is to work in partnership with local government, industry, and the public to achieve a 50 percent reduction in waste disposed by this year, while ensuring environmentally safe landfill disposal capacity.

The Waste Board is one of six boards and departments within the California Environmental Protection Agency (Cal/EPA).

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