Stunning Go for the green Real estate tips Healthy point of VIU

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www.diamondforever.ca Film Credit Camp August 20 – 27 Students in this dynamic & inspiring 8-day credit course in Film Studies learn about today’s issues and their world. Each student has the opportunity to directly address an issue they are passionate about by creating an action plan and documenting it through film. Students are immersed in a field-based, outdoor program that develops team-building skills essential to life, and to the profession of film making. Students will be supervised and instructed by BC certified educators with specialties in experiential education and film. Successful completion provides students with 4 credits in Film Production 12. Applications at Brooks School or online at www.outdoors.sd47.bc.ca outdoors@sd47.bc.ca School District 47 (Powell River) 604 414-4734 Sustainability & Eco-Education Supporting youth in reinventing their world. Powell River Regional District NOTICE SOLID WASTE TIPPING FEE INCREASE WB Contracting is ready to help make your home look and work better for you and the environment! Effective April 1, 2009 the tipping fee for mixed waste delivered to Augusta will be: $200/tonne or $5 minimum per delivery The new fees are required to cover increases to our waste export costs. There has never been a better time than NOW to get those energy saving home renovations done! In addition to the Live Smart BC grants and incentives you can save even more money with the new Home Renovation Tax Credit. Let WB Contracting take care of the paperwork. We are here to work for YOU! Call us today for more information 604.485.6656 www.wbcontracting.ca Authorized by PR Regional District Bylaw 402.3 8 POwEll RIVER lIVINg : april 2009
Things to remember when recycling plastics Ê Make sure what you are dropping at the recycling depot is clean! Food, oil or other contaminants can ruin a whole batch of recycling. Ê Do not put #3 plastic in the bin (usually find the number on the bottom of your plastic item). Ê Styrofoam cannot be recycled — it has to go into solid waste. 203 tonnes of soft and rigid plastics, but 713 tonnes of other recyclables, including paper, boxboard, etc. The low ratio of recyclables to garbage was disturbing, and showed that we, as a community, are not recycling enough. But there was something else that bugged me. Considering plastics are so pervasive in every aspect of our lives I wondered why plastic recyclables were such a small part of the recycling we were sending out. I went down to Augusta Recyclers to talk to manager Bruce Long. I wanted to know what happened to the plastic I dropped off at the depot. He was help- ful, giving me a tour of the facility and explaining that plastics are separated into two types of bales before they are shipped to Vancouver: soft plastics and rigid plastics. “We put all the soft plastics into a holding area until we have enough to make a bale, then we ship it to Merlin Plastics in Vancouver,” Long told me. Soft plastics include plastic bags or any kind of pliable plastic, except bags (like chip bags) that have a foil liner. And rigid plastics? “We take everything except #3,” he said. “That’s PVC and it can’t be recycled.” PVC can’t be recycled?! Knowing that PVC is one of the most common types of plastic, part of my answer was right there. “All the other hard plastics get dumped into one big holding area and crushed into a bale and sent to Merlin Plastics.” But I have read that plastics have to be sorted, and if they aren’t, a contaminant can cause a whole batch of plastic to be thrown out. “Is that true,” I asked? “We don’t have enough volume to sort it,” Long answered. “We try to take dirty plastic out or remove plastics that aren’t supposed to be in there, but Merlin allows us a certain amount of contaminant before the batch is considered unusable.” So all that plastic I take to Augusta gets barged to Vancouver in bales. But what happens to it once it gets to Merlin Plastics? I gave Tony Moucachen, one of the owners, a call to find out. “We take plastics #1, #2, #4 and #5,” Moucachen said. “The #3 [PVC] is a problem — that goes to the dump. We get an average 60 to 70 per cent yield from a bale.” But I know that there are also #6 and #7 plastics. What happens to those? “If there is a market for those kinds of plastics, we resell them; otherwise we dump them in the garbage.” And what about contamination due to food or non-usable plastics? “We have big contamination problems,” he said. “If we are getting a lot of contamination from one source, we might reject the bales, or stop buying them from that source. We have to separate the plastics once they get here, and that’s difficult, so we pay more for plastics that are already properly sorted.” The plastics that Merlin is able to use get melted down into resin and made into pellets. The soft plastic pellets are sold to companies that make new garbage bags; rigid plastic pellets go to companies making things like shampoo or laundry detergent bottles. Merlin Plastics has two plants — one in Calgary, and one in Vancouver — and between them they process one million pounds of plastic every year. But what about the millions upon millions of pounds of plastic that can’t be recycled? I guess that’s where overflowing landfill sites and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch come in. So, what is the answer? Recycling as much as possible is part of it, but because Ken’s Personal Touch Floor & Window Fashions Bamboo Hardwood Cork Laminate Natural Grass Blinds Wool Area Rugs Shaw ‘Green Edge’ Products Kraus ‘Green Choice’ Products Wool Blend Carpet $2.99 sq ft 4683 Marine Avenue tel 604 485-5356 Monday – Friday 9 am – 9 pm Saturday 9 am – 6 pm Sunday 10 am – 5 pm We carry a line of environmentally-friendly products Compostable leaf & garbage bags Stainless Steel Water Bottles Glassware Silicone Sealing Lids, and more... Just ask us. POwEll RIVER lIVINg : april 2009 9
Page 1 and 2: Stunning Texada photos inside Go fo
Page 3 and 4: 7 11 35 Contents: april 2009 Every
Page 5 and 6: It’s NOT easy being green Being g
Page 7: Following the plastic trail Our sle
Page 11 and 12: Alien invasion Stopping invasive sp
Page 13 and 14: PLANET EARTH: Every day is Earth Da
Page 15 and 16: Building green is a way of life Eat
Page 17 and 18: Staging helps homes sell “Wow”
Page 19 and 20: Coming up! Every Woman day of activ
Page 21 and 22: Davie Bay, Texada Photos by Tom Sco
Page 23 and 24: Vancouver Island University, Powell
Page 25 and 26: Doing your best Challenge yourself
Page 27 and 28: By Isabelle Southcott Talking techn
Page 29 and 30: End of an era: Powell River's Moose
Page 31 and 32: Women of the Moose Women of the Moo
Page 33 and 34: A little change goes a long way Ass
Page 35 and 36: Ride to conquer cancer Fundraiser h
Page 37 and 38: Celebrating Excellence in Education
Page 39 and 40: Training tips for beginners Trainer
Page 41 and 42: April 2009 April 8: messy Church, 4
Page 43 and 44: WANT A SHOPPING EXPERIENCE THAT’S

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