Client: CalRecycle

Cascadia has managed and implemented three statewide waste characterization studies for the California Integrated Waste Management Board. For the first study, Cascadia surveyed 2,000 vehicle drivers and 1,280 businesses and apartment complex representatives over two seasons as part of an effort to determine the amounts and composition of waste from five generating sectors (single-family residential, multi-family residential, commercial, residential self-haul and commercial self-haul). For the second study, Cascadia conducted driver surveys and collected waste samples from randomly chosen self-hauled vehicles at 22 landfills and transfer stations distributed among five regions of the state. The third study entailed quantifying and characterizing specific waste streams from four areas of focus that were identified during the second study as containing relatively large amounts of recoverable material. These studies have provided much of the fundamental data that is used by the CIWMB and by jurisdictions throughout California to identify opportunities for additional waste diversion.