The County of Wellington rolled out its new mobile household hazardous waste (HHW) depot at the Aberfoyle Waste Facility on July 2, providing residents the opportunity to safely dispose of all HHW materials on a regular basis.
“This represents a significant service improvement to County of Wellington residents,” commented Warden George Bridge.
“The mobile depot will rotate between the county’s six waste facilities, giving people a year-round option to drop off all of their household hazardous waste items.”
The depot will accept automotive products, cleaners, fertilizers, fire extinguishers, fluorescent bulbs and tubes, medication, mercury thermostats, paints, pesticides, pool chemicals, solvents and more.
The full list of materials and the depot schedule can be found at wellington.ca/sws.
On July 6 the Solid Waste Services (SWS) committee hosted an official opening of the new depot at the Aberfoyle transfer station.
“We are really excited to be making it so much more convenient to divert these harmful chemicals from landfill. It is free to drop these items off, and residents can take advantage of this innovative new service three days a week at our waste facilities,” said SWS committee chair councillor Don McKay.
“This is a fantastic thing for the environment. It allows our residents to bring these hazardous wastes … it’s not a good idea to leave them laying around. They can bring them here, they’ll be well looked after. They’ll be categorized and disposed of in the right manner.”
The mobile HHW depot will be available during regular hours of operation at the host site.
SWS operations superintendant Das Soligo noted residents will now have 155 days per year when they can access the depot. Previously, each waste facility accepted household hazardous waste only one day per year.
While the special waste disposal days were popular with residents, Soligo noted, “One complaint, if there was any, was why can’t you do this every day, every Saturday?”
Soligo said the mobile depot provides a more “cost effective and convenient” option and allows for the acceptance of “a full range” of materials.
“It’s quite an innovative system. As far as I am aware of there is only one other one like it around Ontario,” he said.
