Dive Brief:

• The Recycling Partnership is providing a $500,000 grant to St. Paul, MN to help with the $4 million purchase of recycling carts for more than 78,000 households, as reported by Resource Recycling.
• The city already uses single-stream recycling, but the switch from 14-gallon bins to 64-gallon carts is expected to increase tonnage collected by 35%.
• Participation is also expected to increase by 15% due in part to a $180,000 education budget. The Recycling Partnership will be providing $50,000 for education and outreach along with in-kind support worth an estimated $139,000.

Dive Insight:

The Recycling Partnership has now given 11 cart grants since 2015 and has spurred millions of dollars in recycling infrastructure investment. With a growing list of members and numerous collaborations the nonprofit has become an active proponent of expanding recycling options for communities around the country. In addition to being easier for residents and collection workers, the organization's favored single-stream carts can also result in better material quality.

Nonprofit hauler Eureka Recycling has advocated for the carts, which will now be RFID-enabled as part of a new contract that begins on Jan. 1, 2017. Eureka won this contract over a number of other haulers, including Waste Management and Republic Services.

This development comes as St. Paul moves toward the potentially much larger change of an "organized trash collection system" for residential waste. Public and industry opinions have been mixed, though in July the St. Paul City Council voted to begin working out the details with the goal of implementation by mid-2018.