See SCS Engineers Sustainable Materials Management Services
Do you really need to use a drinking straw? With most beverages, probably not! Make this one change and help America reduce the amount of plastic going into our landfills.
Click to learn more about Sustainable Materials Management.
The initiative to optimize the residential waste and recycling collection system for current and future operations exemplifies the County’s commitment to safe, efficient, and excellent civic services for residents.
The County of Sacramento, Department of Waste Management & Recycling (DWMR) is contracting with SCS Engineers to study and analyze how to optimize the routing, collection, and disposal of municipal solid waste, green waste, organics, and single-stream recycling in the unincorporated area of the county. The analyses will help Sacramento control costs, provide quality services to residents, and lower their carbon footprint.
Using a three-cart system, the DWMR provides weekly residential garbage collection, every other week recycling, green waste collection, and other waste collection services to approximately 155,000 residents in unincorporated Sacramento County.
Currently, vehicles cover 71 routes and collect a total of 151,000 tons of municipal solid waste, 77,000 tons of green waste and organics, and nearly 37, 000 tons of single-stream recycling annually. Materials go to appropriate locations, including the county-owned and operated North Area Recovery Station and the Waste Management owned and operated Sacramento Recycling Center and Transfer Station.
Approximately 60 percent of residential collection activity occurs in the northern half of unincorporated Sacramento County and 40 percent in the southern half. DWMR will use SCS Engineers’ comprehensive analyses and the current residential waste collection and disposal operations to identify options for charting a path forward that will optimize collection efficiencies and reduce collection costs. The analyses examine these areas, as follows:
Regulatory compliance, including comprehensive, cost-effective adherence to all applicable known and anticipated regulations and ordinances
Financial and contractual controls, such as long-term agreements with haulers, processors, contractors, key suppliers, and vendors; infrastructure maintenance and construction
Route logistics and vehicle controls, for example, the number of routes, type of vehicles, safety, carbon footprint reductions, workloads
Community satisfaction with clear communications, ease of disposal, overall convenience, and other factors to continuously improve residential service
The SCS analyses include a model for creating alternative collection scenarios for waste and recycling operations and performing cost modeling. The model gives the County the benefit of insight into many potential options while considering various technology, best practices of the operations staff and fleet crews, and rate structures. The SCS model is in use in cities and counties across the U.S.
“The data and the way it is analyzed and interpreted will lay the foundation for collecting waste and recycling in the unincorporated area of the County,” stated Tracie Bills of SCS Engineers. “The cost savings and environmental benefits are significant supporting Sacramento residents into the future.”
Many schools and school districts are prioritizing a shift toward zero waste and sustainability. However, learning to manage material resources on-site in a more sustainable manner presents operational and monetary challenges. Learn the benefits and steps to plan a financially sustainable program from Tracie Bills of SCS Engineers.
Tracie creates realistic approaches which allow for flexibility while maneuvering the unique challenges that occur. She takes you step-by-step through building a successful program and refers to established efforts such as in the City of San Jose that already have established zero waste programs in their schools.
Read the article by clicking here.
Setting up a school zero waste program takes time, patience, excellent collaboration and communication, and a team that wants to achieve the same goal of zero waste. Tracie Bills recommends a realistic approach in her article. She provides examples and describes how a consulting firms, such as SCS Engineers, assist schools without materials management programs to launch zero waste programs.
Building a successful program does not happen overnight, but you can do it!
Tracie Onstad Bills is SCS Engineers Northern California Director of Sustainable Materials Management. She has over 20 years of materials management experience, including working for a hauler, a county government, and a nonprofit, and over 12 years of experience with materials management consulting firms. She has provided commercial sector materials flow assessments; organics processing research and analysis; waste characterization studies; and recycling, organics, and waste management technical assistance to government agencies, schools, multi-family dwellings, and businesses. Ms. Bills has an environmental science degree from San Jose State and is an instructor for the SWANA Zero Waste certification program.
National Waste and Recycling Association is sponsoring a FREE 90-minute webinar on December 6 at 3:00 pm ET. The webinar is highlighting the programs, strategies, and best practices of their six 2017 Recycling Award Winners.
The recipients will describe their unique blend of technologies, outreach, and program management that made a difference in their communities. The audience will have a chance to ask questions and find out how to implement these innovative ideas into their own operations and businesses.
Agenda:
More Solid Waste Management resources and success stories here.
Thanks to you, our clients, SCS Engineers has received many awards and industry recognitions for research achievements and technology innovations. Engineering News-Record (ENR) recently released the Top 500 Design List, ranking SCS Engineers in the top 100 for the 9th year in a row. In the same publication, SCS is ranked in the Top 10 Sewerage/ Wastewater Firms.
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Read and share the WasteAdvantage article describing the solution process here. Written by:
In the EPA’s Region 9 U.S.-Mexico Border Program Progress Report, April-September 2016
The Campo Band of Mission Indians (CBMI) staff members are working with the EPA and SCS Engineers to address their waste management needs. SCS Engineers, an environmental engineering firm, was contracted by the Border Environment Cooperation Commission to work with CBMI in response to their request for technical assistance.
SCS Engineers was contracted to prepare a waste characterization study to support the development of a zero waste plan. The study provides critical information for designing and developing the future programs, policies, and facilities to effectively achieve a zero waste program.
Based on the findings, CBMI will assess their infrastructure needs, including consideration of a transfer station. SCS Engineers conducted field sampling to assess the Golden Acorn Casino in September 2016, the same month that Jeff Scott, EPA’s Land Divison Director visited Campo.
The Border 2020 Program is the latest environmental program implemented under the 1983 La Paz Agreement. It builds on the Border 2012 Environmental Program, emphasizing regional, bottom-up approaches for decision making, priority setting, and project implementation to address the environmental and public health problems in the border region. As in Border 2012, the new Program encourages meaningful participation from communities and local stakeholders.
Read the full article by Marc Rogoff, SCS Engineers.
“This program directly supports the county’s Roadmap to a Sustainable Waste Management Future by helping businesses to implement recycling programs,” says Leonard. “And not only recycling but waste reduction, as well, all of which, of course, contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, resource management and sustainable materials management.”
Read the article about L.A. County’s Plan for Sustainable Waste Management
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