The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality has released the official calculation of Tillamook County’s recycling and recovery rate for the year 2017. Tillamook County generated 27,325 tons of waste and achieved a recovery rate of 28.2%.
Tillamook County Solid Waste Program Manager David McCall said: “While our recovery rate is commendable and on par with the national average, we still need to strive for increased waste prevention, reuse, and recycling. Every pound of waste which we don’t produce is waste which we don’t have to handle, and every pound of waste which we divert from the landfill saves our county money in disposal costs. We are still sending far too many tons of waste to the landfill near Corvallis every year, which comes at a cost to county tax payers. It has always been my goal to reduce our outgoing waste to about 15,000 tons, which would translate into a 50% diversion rate. This is economically realistic and feasible.”
The full 2017 Oregon Material Recovery and Waste Generation Rates Report is available on the DEQ Web site at www.oregon.gov/deq/recycling/Pages/Survey.aspx
For more details about the Tillamook County results or recycling in general, please contact the Tillamook County Solid Waste Department at www.co.tillamook.or.us/gov/SolidWaste or call 503-815-3975.
