Rankin Inlet -40 C |
The population is about 2,300 and is about 80 % Inuit so that it is a fascinating opportunity to have a glimpse at the Inuit culture. There are 830 registered vehicles - mostly trucks and SUV's. Snowmobiles do not need to be registered, but I would have to guess there at least as many snowmobiles, if not more, around town. We have seen the odd ATV, but I expect we'd see more in summer months.
Polar Bear Hides |
Rear Loader - Cleaning out Co-op Dumpster |
Household garbabe barrels |
The town provides twice a week collection. The collection crew stops at each household stop and hand bombs out of the barrels into the truck hopper. They do the same at the commercial bins. We observed the collectors picking up waste at the Co-op store and watched them lean over the edge of the bin to reach the bottom to pick out the waste to throw in into the truck. I expect the same practice would happen at the barrels used at households.
This would seem to be a very inefficient method of collection, but you need to put it all into context. Why twice a week collection? That seems expensive and unwarranted, especially in such a cold environment. But, as we observed during our week in Rankin, the garbage bins are continually visited by Ravens. Ravens are a very intelligent and strong bird. If the garbage is left too long, the ravens will pick away at the garbage bags, tear them open and scatter them around. They can make a real mess. So the twice weekly collection reduces the mess that the ravens create.
While we were here, the collection truck had a hydraulic line break and was out of service, so we could see what happens as the waste piles up in and around the bins. Since there are only 2 mechanics in town, sometimes repairs can take quite some time as there is always a line up of vehicles to be repaired. We haven't heard the status of the garbage truck repair, but I would hope it gets some priority on the repair list.
One could also suggest that the method of collection is labour intensive, time consuming, and fraught with safety issues. Automated collection is not an option here because of the snowfall that would make bin access difficult, if not impossible. Costs of everything in this part of the county is high and garbage cans are expensive, but barrels are free. There are lots of barrels because goods are brought in barrels, but the barrels never leave, so they are used for waste cans.
Jobs are scarce in communities like this, so adding extra labour to collect waste helps create needed jobs. That is a benefit to the community in many ways. I learned this a few years ago when I worked on a project for the Bahamas. Garbage collection in that case was considered a 'make work' project, so 4 man crews made sense to them. Here, the truck has a 3 man crew and runs 5 days a week.
Rankin Inlet Landfill |
The Rankin Inlet landfill does not have a gate, nor is it manned. This is also the normal practice in Nunavut. When the town had planned to open the new site, word got around town, and mysteriously, the fencing that was around the site started to disappear. Someone said that shortly after that, there was some nice chain link fencing that seemed to appear at the sled dog compounds that are around town.
Nunavut Training |
In a few weeks time, the folks that came to the course will make a trip to Edmonton where they will be give additional training for CFC removal and certification, International Marine Transportation of Dangerous Goods, and they will be getting hands on experience in handling and sorting household hazardous waste at the City of Edmonton EcoStations. They will also visit Edmonton area landfills and will be given a tour of Edmonton's world class waste management facilities.
Metal Pile on Shore of Hudson Bay |
After we finished the course today, the folks from Cambridge Bay told me that they had a discussion the evening before and were going to make changes in the way they do things because of what they had learned over the past few days. Cambridge Bay has a new landfill and had undertaken a large clean up of their metal piles over the past year. The unfortunate part of this story is that the metal was burried - not recycled. But that's the economic reality that they face with getting this material to a market.
This is the second year of training for Nunavut. At some point, we hope to have developed trainers in Nunavut to take our place. Unfortunately, that will mean that I won't have the great pleasure of traveling to Nunavut, enjoying the culture of the north, and working with these great people.
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