San Francisco ups the recycling ante

Within days after a newly elected member of the Dallas City Council wanted to know what the effects would be on raising rates to the McCommas Bluff Landfill, the city of San Francisco is adopting measures to divert all waste from its landfills.

San Francisco is going to be giving its residents three mandatory garbage bins, one for trash, another for recylables (like many [I'm an exception, much to my chagrin] residents in Dallas receive) and a third for compost. Not only that, if residents don't separate correctly, they could be fined, although fines are being suspended until 2011 until residents learn how to separate.

San Francisco's Board of Supervisors (its city council) passed this new ordinance Tuesday night on a 9-2 vote. The goal is to be sending zero waste to landfills by the year 2020. The city already diverts an amazing 72 percent of its residential waste away from landfills and into recycling and composting programs.