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Leading the Way: Environmental Efforts in the NW
Waste Management is proud to sponsor the Northwest's largest sustainable lifestyle event. Our employees in the Northwest have doubled the amount of community outreach and environmental education they’ve provided in their communities within the last year.
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We are consistently enhancing our services to achieve or exceed the environmental goals and objectives of our customers. By 2020, Waste Management plans to triple the amount of recyclables we collect, double our production of renewable energy, improve fleet fuel efficiency, reduce fleet emissions by 15% and amplify our efforts to restore wildlife habitats across North America.
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| Recycling
In Oregon, Waste Management is planning the construction of a new recycling facility at the Hillsboro Landfill that will recover recyclable materials from 300,000 to 400,000 tons of construction and demolition materials each year. This facility will be dedicated to recovering materials that previously were destined for the landfill. In the near future, we’ll also be constructing new recycling centers in Central and Eastern Washington, at Waste Management’s Graham Road Landfill in Spokane and at the Greater Wenatchee Landfill.
WM is the founding corporate sponsor of Freecycle, the world’s largest volunteer network of people devoted to reusing, rather than disposing of unneeded items. Freecycle now has three million members, and is adding 20,000 new members each month. |
Recyling Made Easy By Mail
Waste Management now offers convenient, safe mail-back recycling and disposal programs for the collection of fluorescent bulbs, batteries, electronic waste and sharps. The following programs are available to commercial and residential customers:
• WMLamptracker™
• WMBatteryTracker™
• eScrapTracker™
• Sharps by Mail |
Wetlands Preservation & Wildlife Habitat Protection
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Waste Management operates 24 landfills throughout North America that have special wildlife habitat and wetlands protection programs certified by the Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC). Many of our disposal facilities have large buffer range lands managed for both agricultural and wildlife habitat purposes. |
• The Hillsboro Landfill, in Washington County, Oregon and Riverbend Landfill in Yamhill County, Oregon have both earned prestigious WHC certification.
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• Waste Management employees are also active supporters of the adjacent Jackson Bottom Wetland Preserve, a 725-acre preserve that is habitat for local wildlife, and migratory birds.
• Columbia Ridge Landfill in Arlington, Oregon, includes more than 10,000 acres of range land managed for both agricultural production and wildlife habitat, 4,000 acres in Washington is similarly configured.
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Clean Fuels & Low Emission Vehicles
Waste Management has implemented the use of biodiesel blend fuel in our entire Puget Sound fleet and in our Portland residential collection fleet.
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Biodiesel produces less air pollution than petroleum diesel fuels, emitting lower levels of carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, and particulate matter.
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Waste Management is paving the way in fleet technology by partnering with Peterbuilt to pilot the first hybrid garbage truck in 2008. Our next step will be to combine the hybrid technology
with LNG fuel produced from gas from our landfills — which is a program we are working on right now with a large gas supply company. |
Renewable Energy
Nationwide, Waste Management is one of the largest producers of renewable energy, leading the way in implementing technologies that extract energy from what was previously a lost resource.
In the Pacific Northwest, we’ve put many resources into producing renewable energy at the Columbia Ridge Landfill in Arlington, Oregon, which provides disposal services for the municipalities throughout the Northwest, including the cities of Seattle and Portland.
Together with other waste to energy projects across North America, the company expects to produce enough energy to power the equivalent of two million homes, more than double the energy it currently provides.
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