Reclaimed Material Has Potential Of Adding Cash To City's Coffers

Stockpiles of construction and demolition waste diverted for the last three and a half years away from the landfill may end up helping out the City’s bottom line under a proposal to crush the materials and recycle them.

At Wednesday evening’s special meeting of Council a presentation was made by Darrin Stephanson manager of utilities which would see the mountains of diverted cement and asphalt ground up and either used by the City or sold off to private users.

Under the proposal the estimated 18,000 cubic metres (9,200 tonnes) of concrete and 8,000 cubic metres (3,600 tonnes) of asphalt would be ground up by a contractor at a cost estimated at $14 per cubic metre or $179,200. The volume of the materials diverted and stockpiled is approximately four months of landfill waste over the three and a half year period or 10 percent of the waste taken to the landfill.

The asphalt would be crushed into 3/4-inch aggregate suitable for limited applications in back lanes and gravel roads. The concrete would be crushed into 7/8-inch crushed aggregate and used in wet excavations such as water main breaks, service leaks and some hydrant and valve repairs, according to the report.

The current market value of crushed 3/4 inch aggregate is $45 per tonne and 7/8 of an inch aggregate is $35 per tonne making the the estimated value of the stockpiled reclaimed material worth approximately $540,000. The cost of crushing is $179,200 leaving the City with material worth up to $308,800 which could be sold after the City retains two year’s supply for their use.

Funding for the crushing would come from the inventory cash flow accounts with no need to increase taxes.

The estimated stockpile of reclaimed cement when crushed would equal 18 years of use by the City and the asphalt would equal seven years of use by the City leaving the City with a large quantity of aggregate to sell, Stephanson said, adding the material had more uses in industry beyond what the City uses it for.

“It would take a long time for the City to burn through this and in the meantime we would continue to accumulate new reserves of this material. I guess I should mention this material comes from a wide variety of sources so some of our road programs would generate some of the asphalt reclaim…as well as we do get this material from commercial contractors who work in the industry,” he said.

The crushed material would be billed out to the various projects it is used for as is presently done for products now purchased under tender by the City. The material will be purchased by projects the City does at the contracted price estimated to be $14 per tonne.

Profits from selling the aggregate to private contractors would be used for capital needs.

Councillor Brian Swanson asked a question on how a large part of the reclaimed cement came into the City’s possession specifically if the Province had paid for dumping the demolition materials from the former Moose Jaw Union Hospital.

“Question for Administration when the Union Hospital was demolished did we bill for dumping fees?” Councillor Brian Swanson asked.

City manager Jim Puffalt replied he did not know how the issue tied into the report.

“Did we let the Province off the hook for dumping all of this material?” Councillor Swanson asked.

Regarding the dumping fees Puffalt said “We will certainly endeavour to provide that information and perhaps we are making some money off of the Province still. It may be a good thing we don’t know.”

SEE FULL EXCHANGE - Former Union Hospital - Question Asked If Dumping Fees Waived For Province

Regarding contamination concerns of the material Stephanson said it was part of the discussion when speak to crushing contractors.

“We have had that discussion when we talked to a couple of contractors about the material. We even had one come for a site visit and it is fairly consistent with the types of material they see in this practice,” Stephanson said.

Councillor Scott McMann asked if there was the opportunity to charge for the materials to get some offsets and pay for the crushing.

“That is definitely something we will be looking at as part of our business plan. Our ability to do that now is we can’t. We can’t weigh this material to accurately receive it and charge for it without a lot of additional work on the contractor’s behalf just given the locations where the materials are versus where the landfill is,” Stephanson said, adding some municipalities charge a small fee but many were trying to encourage it to be recalimed rather than disposed of or taken elsewhere.

Puffalt said there was an opportunity to make money on the materials coming into the City and then sold out but it would likely have to wait until the move to the new landfill where conditions would exist to store it and weigh it.

Mayor Fraser Tolmie said he agreed with the proposal.

“I am very happy with this recommendation. We cannot argue the points of the past but with having this in place the future we be in say another issue like the Union Hospital were to come to us then it creates an opportunty to capitalize on that whereas back then whatever the decision was we didn’t have that opportunity so I am grateful for this recommendation,” Mayor Tolmie said.

Councillor Chris Warren said he was in support of the initiative because it diverted material from the landfill and the potential uses by the City as well as a revenue source.

“It is going to lower our unit costs when it comes to this type of work,” Councillor Warren said.

“It’s a great program…and been effective in other locations,” Puffalt said.

Crushing the amount of material the City has diverted and stockpiled into aggregate could take more than a year to complete.

Council voted unanimously to proceed with the initiative.