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LIVEGreen Wednesday.April 17.2013 | Powell River Peak Âť prpeak.com
B2 Wednesday.April 17.2013 | Powell River Peak » prpeak.com
Cycling benefits add up
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HEALTHY LIVING: Chris Morwood, vice-president of Powell River Cycling Association, pulls daughter Mirinde in a bike trailer, while son Reeve follows on his little bike. Segregated bike lanes promote safety and encourage residents to cycle. Contributed photo
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When people hop on their bicycles and pedal to work, to run errands or for recreation, they are not only doing a good thing for their health. They are helping to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and to prevent climate change. Powell River Cycling Association (PRCA) has undertaken a great deal of work to describe how the uptake of cycling can be improved in Powell River. The group remains committed to working with the City of Powell River to translate that work into measurable increased cycling in the community. “There are many benefits to cycling that go beyond what you might expect,” said Chris
one of the driving forces of climate change. Human activity is interfering with the planet’s climate system, causing the Earth to become warmer. Increased concentrations of GHG in the atmosphere is the leading cause of global warming. The average car emits four tons of pollutants each year. The health benefits of cycling continue to be widely documented. A recent study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that biking for transportation appears more helpful in losing weight and promoting health than working out at the gym. The four-year study of 822 adults found that people commuting to work by car gained more weight on average, even if they engaged in regular exercise, than people who did not commute by car. The authors of the study recommended creating more opportunities for everyone to walk or bike to work. Morwood pointed out t h a t t h e m o s t »B3
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Laura Walz editor@prpeak.com
Morwood, PRCA’s vice-president. “But there’s a catch: if you want to enable more people to ride to work, or to school, or to go shopping, you need to provide routes, paths and lanes where they feel comfortable and safe on their bikes. There are many studies showing that improving cycling infrastructure not only improves people’s health and fitness, but also reduces personal and municipal transportation costs, reduces greenhouse gas emissions and improves the local economy.” Community energy and emissions inventories were established after the provincial government committed to reducing its GHG emissions from 2007 levels by 33 per cent in 2020 and 80 per cent in 2050. The inventory found on-road transportation was the largest source of emissions in Powell River in 2007. Private vehicles are responsible for 60 per cent of total emissions. The buildup of GHG emissions in the atmosphere is
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Residents cite safety concerns as primary reason for not using bicycles
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Intentional development would make cycling more appealing successful cycling cities and towns are not necessarily the most flat or the warmest or the most affluent. “In fact the opposite is sometimes true,” he said. “What these places have in common is that bikes are considered to be essential tools, tools that can be used by most people, in most weather, in normal clothes. No fancy bikes or advanced skills or spandex are required, just reasonable health and safe infrastructure.” Studies consistently show the health benefits of walking and cycling far outweigh the risk of injury. From an individual and public health perspective, cycling and walking should be promoted and encouraged. Public policies to slow down traffic and infrastructure that make drivers more aware, such as sidewalks and segregated bike lanes, improve safety.
In 2010, PRCA made a presentation to city council about the need for a cycling network plan, to include both trail and road strategy. The existing OCP (official community plan) suggested developing one kilometre of bike lane per year, but that has never happened. PRCA made another presentation to the city’s committee of the whole in 2011, for the recently elected mayor and council. The group’s ideas were generally supported in principle and were referred to planning and engineering staff. A community forum was held and feedback compiled, which identified safety as the primary obstacle to cycling in Powell River. Subsequently, planning staff created a draft cycling network plan. The city then developed “sharrows,” hybrid bike lanes that have painted decals on the road depicting a cyclist, on por-
tions of Joyce and Manson avenues. Around the same time, Tourism Powell River adopted a new map with a few proposed “routes” from the draft network plan. No further work on cycling infrastructure has been done
The city has initiated a review of its OCP and PRCA has presented information at meetings associated with the review. Numerous community members at town hall meetings have expressed interest in an alternative
Studies consistently show the health benefits of walking and cycling far outweigh the risk of injury. since that time. Despite the lack of progress by the city to improve infrastructure, cycling continues to grow in Powell River. Bike to Work Week is an annual event that promotes cycling as a viable alternative to driving to and from work, in particular. It started from scratch in 2011 in Powell River and in 2012, nearly 200 cyclists participated, recording over 8,000 kilometres during the week.
transportation strategy and cycling infrastructure. “The upcoming OCP sessions in Westview, Townsite, Cranberry and Wildwood are ideal places for residents to help draft a vision for where we want to go together as a community and how we want to get there,” said Morwood. “After that, it’s up to our city staff, council and mayor, with support from citizens, to implement those visions in a sustainable way.”
Other BC communities are already moving forward, said Morwood. “The town of Smithers is partnering with its health authority to fund bike paths,” he said. “Salt Spring Island got organized and was just given $1.2 million in federal gas tax grants for cycling and walking paths. If we make it a priority, we can make it happen.” Morwood continues to meet and discuss issues with staff from both the city and Powell River Regional District. He has asked for council’s support of this year’s Bike to Work Week. Along with developing a bicycle network plan for Powell River and making it policy within the OCP, it is also important to press city officials to develop policy that focuses on densification/intensification within the core areas of the city, said Jon van Oostveen, a PRCA member who is part of a cycling infrastructure
committee. “By increasing the number of people that live per hectare, there is a direct increase in the use of alternative transportation,” he said. “When living close to, above or beside retail areas, people are more likely to walk, get on a bike or take transit to do errands.” He believes the city should encourage densification by creating incentives and development-friendly zoning to create mixed use and residential buildings in and near the central business district, van Oostveen added. “Allowing existing property owners to build carriage houses, granny flats and convert existing housing stock into multiple unit dwellings are methods by which Powell River can make the bicycle the preferred choice of transportation. Making cycling more accessible, safer and easier in Powell River will go a long way in making the bike an essential tool.”
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Trash-talking team extends term Chris Bolster reporter@prpeak.com
Powell River’s Let’s Talk Trash team has experienced lots of change recently and all of it positive. BHC Consulting, which runs the Let’s Talk Trash program, has had its twoyear contract extended with Powell River Regional District, has moved its office into a more permanent location at the Rodmay Hotel and has added new members to the team. Since 2011 the team has worked to educate the public about waste and how to reduce the amount of garbage that ends up in landfills. In 2010 Coco Hess and Abby McLennan, of BHC Consulting, entered their bid on Powell River Regional District’s request for an organization to handle the education component of its solid waste management plan. “It’s an innovative program which focuses on sustainable waste management for schools, businesses and the community,” said Hess.
Hess hopes attitudes toward how trash is handled will start to change. “People don’t actually think about their waste,” said McLennan. “They just put it out on the curb and it goes away.” In November and December 2012 the Let’s Talk Trash team hosted a zero waste challenge to encourage community members to reduce their waste for two months and track the amount of waste diverted from the landfill through composting, recycling or refundables. The challenge began with a conference, which over 100 people attended. Twenty-three households and four classrooms participated in the challenge. Six hundred pounds of compost, 370 pounds of recyclables and 40 pounds of glass were diverted. “The biggest take-away for us,” said Hess, “was that only six and a half pounds of trash per month from each household were added to the waste stream.” Zero waste advocates gen-
erally strive for an approximate 85 per cent reduction in garbage entering landfills, but with more knowledge about what materials can be recycled or reused that number can be as high as 92 per cent. “It’s pretty shocking when you do a waste audit to see how much is divertable,”
most things can and it’s just a question of knowing where to take them. “People often think Sunset Coast Bottle Depot is just the place to return their empties, but they also take old curling irons, microwaves and computers,” said Hess. For people who have unused medications in their
The biggest thing you learn when you start looking at your trash and wanting to reduce your waste is what you’re consuming. Abby McLennan Let’s Talk Trash team
said McLennan. “The biggest thing you learn when you start looking at your trash and wanting to reduce your waste is what you’re consuming.” McLennan suggests people consider what happens with items at the end of their usable life and to purchase accordingly. There are few items that can’t be recycled these days, dental floss for example, but
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home, the provincial government has a program with pharmacies to dispose of them safely. With Earth Day coming up on Monday, April 22, the team has organized a film and community cleanup. Trashed is a documentary film which takes Oscarwinning actor Jeremy Irons on “a journey of discovery, disbelief and hope,” as he
looks at how society deals with garbage. The film will be shown at 1:30 pm on Saturday, April 20, at the Patricia Theatre. Admission is by donation. The Let’s Talk Trash team is also organizing this year’s annual Trash Bash, a community cleanup program which starts at 9:30 am on Saturday, April 27, at Willingdon Beach. Registration is free and participants will be given an area to clean up. At the end, a competition will be held to see who picked up the most garbage. A complimentary lunch will be provided. To pre-register readers can email trashbash@powellriverrd.bc.ca. Lesley Thorsell has joined the team as a zero waste events coordinator to help set up, organize and coordinate zero waste stations at music festivals, Sea Fair, Blackberry festival and any other public event. Let’s Talk Trash will host two workshops on composting at the Compost Education Centre in the community garden behind
Powell River Community Resource Centre. Master composter Carol Engram will give a talk, entitled Worms Work, from 6:30 to 8 pm, Thursday, April 18 on how to build and maintain a worm bin, and discuss how worms break down kitchen leftovers and reduce the amount of organic waste going into the landfill. For people who do not have the option to compost outside, Heather Claxton from Mother Nature will give a workshop on Bokashi composting, from 1 to 2:30 pm on Saturday, April 20. Bokashi uses fermentation to compost even meat, fish and dairy without producing odours or attracting unwanted insects and rodents. To register, readers can contact the Let’s Talk Trash team by email letstalktrashteam@gmail.com. To keep up-to-date with what the team is up to, readers can visit http://letstalktrashpr.com or listen to Hess and McLennan’s biweekly radio program and podcasts on CJMP 90.1FM.
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Engaging employees in action Earth Day encourages energy reduction
engagement programs are important. It views corporate triple bottom line as people, planet, profit. A sense of shared ownerIt can be a lonely road being an environ- ship can grow when employees are free to mental steward, but it doesn’t have to be. engage in and lead peer-driven, bottom-up National charity Earth Day Canada is doing initiatives. Communication between workits best to remind people of this on Earth ers and management becomes two-way Day, Monday, April 22. when working together on a project with Peer pressure works, whether in the school a shared goal. Lasting commitment and playground, workplace kitchen or at home. change can happen through recognizing efWhen groups are motivated, they can carry forts, acknowledging success and using ineach other and set goals that are achievable centives. In essence, employee engagement and meaningful. programs can increase morale, productivCompanies recognize that to help with ity, satisfaction in work and employee redelivering the message of sustainable tention. The bottom line becomes a strategies, each needs to look at win, win, win. its own workforce and start inPeople are encouraged to calcuhouse with group-facilitated late their own carbon footprint. initiatives. As many take electricity to be Earth An article relating energya cleaner energy, with each Day saving tips, how to calculate kilowatt hour consumed, 0.85 Monday, consumption of greenhouse kilograms of carbon dioxide is April 22 gases, and myth busters about accumulated. the use of lights, was circulated to Adding up a family’s entire employees of Lafarge Texada Island year’s worth of electricity, and realizby the Western Canada Environment Group, ing this is just one household, creates a stagreminding them of Earth Day. geringly sobering vision of the extent of our Concentrating on electricity use, tips carbon dioxide fix. include switching incandescent bulbs for Whether it is an initiative at work, or compact fluorescent lights; turning off an initiative at home, doing what one can lights, heating and appliances when not to help sustain the environment, yet still required; purchasing energy-efficient ap- enjoy quality of life, is worth every mopliances; hanging laundry outside rather ment of thought invested. Thought, after than putting it into the dryer; avoiding all, takes no electricity to generate (at least “phantom” load by unplugging items not not in the sense of visible hydro lines), acbeing used; and monitoring electricity use cumulates no carbon footprint, and yet through employment of an energy meter or is a renewable source of energy. Putting energy monitoring power bar. thought into action is a step toward living Earth Day Canada sets out why employee green.
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B6 Wednesday.April 17.2013 | Powell River Peak » prpeak.com
Company program encourages students to recycle batteries Top classes win a pizza party Laura Walz editor@prpeak.com
A Texada Island company is marking Earth Day by reaching out to area schools with a battery recycling program. Warren Kiland, maintenance manager at Texada Quarrying Ltd., a wholly owned subsidiary of Lafarge Canada Inc., is organizing the program through School District 47. The company hopes kindergarten to grade seven classes in all elementary schools will participate. Students have been asked to bring in used batteries from their homes. Each school will have its own competition and Lafarge will give the winning class in each school a pizza party in appreciation of their hard work. Kiland previously managed a ready mix plant in Alberta and was involved in a similar initiative there. He started the program in Powell River’s school district after he moved to Texada two years ago. “It’s been a Lafarge program in a number of places,” he said. “To minimize the amount of hazardous waste being disposed of in our landfills, this program diverts toxic heavy metals, such as cadmium, nickel, lithium and zinc, contained in batteries for recycling.” Every year, nearly three billion batteries are thrown away by households across Canada. By recycling batteries, residents make a positive »B7
MAKING A DIFFERENCE: Grade two-three students in Jemma Culos’s class at Henderson Elementary School, including [from left] Megan Moore, Kyle Barnes, Layna Van Asseldonk and Declan Gillen, are participating in a battery recycling program sponsored by Texada Island Quarrying Ltd. Laura Walz photo
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Protecting planet part of company policy 8« BATTERIES difference and help reduce the amount of waste being disposed of in landfills. Recycling batteries is good for the environment. It keeps them out of the landfill, where heavy metals may leak into the ground when the battery casing corrodes, causing soil and water pollution. If batteries are incinerated with household waste, the heavy metals in them may cause air pollution. “If we all work together, we can make a difference.” The following batteries can be recycled in the company’s battery recycling program: • Household-type alkaline batteries, used for hearing aids, remote controls, flashlights, toys. • Lithium batteries, used for cameras. • Nickel cadmium batter-
ies, used in cell phones, laptops, PDAs (personal digital assistants). • Nickel metal hydride batteries, used in cell phones, laptops, PDAs. • Zinc chloride or zinc carbon batteries, used in remote
picking up all the batteries on April 19. They’ll be counted and the winners will be announced on Earth Day, April 22. Lafarge will also send notices to each school, letting them know how many bat-
We aim to use energy and natural resources more efficiently WARREN KILAND
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controls, flashlights, toys. All the batteries students bring in to their schools will be put in bins. Rechargeable batteries need to be separately stored in individual plastic bags. “We take all those,” Kiland said. The batteries will be sent away to a permitted and licensed facility for recycling. Lafarge employees will be
teries each class collected and the total for each school, as well as the winning class. An overall champion will also be announced. Lafarge has an environmental policy, which states in part: “We are committed to the protection of the environment, human health and well being, to the mitigation of climate change and the
conservation of nature. Our objective is to ensure the continued improvement of our environmental performance. We aim to use energy and natural resources more efficiently, minimize the production of waste, air emissions and water consumption and wastewater discharges, while seeking ways to preserve heritage, landscape and biological diversity.” The policy is an important statement on the company’s position with respect to the environment, especially in light of the growing concern over the effects human beings are having on the planet, Kiland pointed out. “As a company, we have undertaken many initiatives to ensure that our footprint is minimized and we are committed to continually improving our environmental practices.”
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Reducing greenhouse gas emissions As the only construction material that is derived from a renewable source, wood products help to reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Here are 10 tips for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by using wood. 1. Opt for wood as the main material for any type of construction. 2. Insist on certified wood, proof that it comes from sustainably managed forests. 3. Say “no” to treated wood as it is toxic for the environment and human health. 4. Buy wood products manufactured locally, supporting local economy and reducing transportation. 5. Find a way to re-use wood rather than discarding it. 6. Wood which is no longer of any use for projects can be taken to recycling centres. 7. Planting a tree can make property more attractive. It will also shelter homes from wind and shade them from sun. 8. Be aware of where paper comes from and be selective on how much is used. 9. Follow planting regulations by not placing a tree too close to electricity lines. 10. Know more about recognized certifications by visiting www.certificationcanada.org.
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