New Bowen Resource Recovery Report

Posted by James Glave James Glave on August 16, 2011

"Organics" is more than just a sign hanging over the small section of your local produce department. In the resource-recovery world, the term refers as well to the bits left over after eating an apple or peeling a peach—as well as kitchen scraps, vegetable trimmings, grass clippings, branches, leaves, and other so-called "green waste" plant materials, woody or soft, that are used or generated, as well as manures. From an agricultural perspective, all of this material is potential soil—and a precious commodity in a community not blessed with abundant native quantities of loamy rich earth.

Put simply, organics are not something we can afford to throw away. Which is why many of us are turning away from the "green waste" mindset and thinking instead of this useful material as "future soil." However, the path from A to B is fraught with complexity.

In an effort to consider the various options against the context of a small community with limited tax base and unique challenges and circumstances, earlier this year, the Bowen Island Re-use-it Store Society—operators of the Knick Knack Nook second-hand store adjacent to the Bowen Island Recycling Center —retained islander Morganne Keplar of ReSource-Full Habitats.