BEMIDJI, Minn. — Bill Patnaude and Denney Hanselman will examine the status of solid waste collection, disposal and recycling on both county and state levels during a 10 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 4, program at the Bemidji State University Center for Research and Innovation (CRI), located at 3801 Bemidji Avenue North.

Free and open to the public, the 90-minute session is final lecture of the fall Tuesday morning series sponsored by the Academy of Lifelong Learning (ALL) and coordinated by the CRI. The next group of lectures will begin in the spring.

The Beltrami County environmental services director, Patnaude will discuss the current system, explaining what items are being put into the waste stream, how they are collected, where processing takes place and what the end products are.

Hanselman, a regional solid waste planner with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency in Detroit Lakes, will discuss the responsibility of the MPCA in developing markets for recyclable products and where the waste is going across the country and around the world.

The presenters will also show a video detailing how the integrated garbage process works, from the garbage bag to final disposal through burning, land-filling or recycling. They will then explain statistics on the volume of solid waste discarded by Beltrami county residents as well as recycling percentages over the past five years.

“We have a contract with Polk County to send the waste we generate to them for incineration, and the current service fee system doesn’t promote reduction or recycling,” Patnaude said. “As a result, there’s not a lot of incentive to recycle.

“Right now Beltrami County is somewhere in the middle of Minnesota counties for recycling,” Patnaude added. “ Those who have higher percentages have an aggressive program for collection and marketing.”

In Beltrami County, the primary recycled products are high-grade office paper, corrugate, aluminum, catalogs, magazines, newspapers, glass and tin. Patnaude used cardboard as an example of recycling worldwide. Corrugate from the county, he noted, is placed in containers, transported to the West Coast, shipped to China, and integrated with that country’s cardboard to make their product more durable.

The Academy of Lifelong Learning offers humanities-based programs made possible in part with private donations and support from Bemidji State University.

Individuals who wish to be added to the ALL mailing list or have questions about this program should contact the Bemidji State University Center for Research and Innovation at (218) 755-4900; toll free, (888) 738-3224; email, cri@bemidjistate.edu; or at http://www.cri-bsu.org.

FOR YOUR CALENDAR
Nov. 4 – 10 a.m. – Bemidji State University Center for Research and Innovation hosts Academy of Lifelong Learning lecture the status of solid waste collection, disposal and recycling on both county and state levels. Presenters: Bill Patnaude, Beltrami Environmental Services director, and Denney Hanselman, MPCA regional solid waste planner. Location: CRI; 3801 Bemidji Ave. N., Bemidji, Minn. Cost: free. For information: (218) 755-4900; (888) 738-3224; http://www.cri-bsu.org.