When old batteries and half-empty paint cans pile up at home, so can our anxiety level. Questions like: ‘What am I supposed to do with this stuff?’ or ‘How do I properly dispose of this waste?’ nag us every time we stub our toe on a paint can or get a hand full of dead AA’s while rummaging through a kitchen cupboard.
Now, thanks to a website operated by Stewardship Ontario, we can rest easy. Do What You Can.ca is designed to help people deal with waste responsibly. Visitors to the site can search by municipality, postal code, or material for drop-off locations for household hazardous and special waste and for broken or unwanted electronics – items that can’t simply be tossed in the garbage or into the Blue Bin. Manufacturers and retailers are now working with municipalities to create a safe and convenient system of disposal for ‘special care’ household refuse. The target is to divert more than 33,000 tonnes of hazardous or special waste from landfills in the first five years.
The electronics branch of the program is cared for by Ontario Electronic Stewardship (OES) and also aims to decrease the amount of unwanted equipment ending up in landfills through reuse of parts/materials and recycling.
In the end, it’s up to each and every one of us to make the system work. Stewardship Ontario has taken care of the logistics and all they ask of us is that we do what we can. Not only is it not asking too much, it’s probably just what we all wanted to know – how to dispose of that ‘special waste’ properly!
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