What does the city of Toronto offer residents?
Liesman: The city of Toronto began curbside pickup of EPS foam in November or December of 2008. Their focus has been, like many places in California, to address a significant litter problem in the greater Toronto area. They identified that paper cups, water bottles, and bags were causing significant litter issues in the area. They set up a joint commission and found that there is really no meaningful way of recycling paper cups with a polyethylene coated lining on the inside, whereas EPS foam can be recycled, and is being recycled, by the Canadian Polystyrene Recycling Alliance (CPRA) to produce picture frames. VerdeX: What are the particular industry challenges of recycling post consumer polystyrene food packaging? Liesman: The most significant is contamination of the product. It is difficult to separate the contaminants. When I speak of contaminants I am not only speaking about food-type contamination—left over food products in the product itself—but also other materials that get mix
