What is WRED?
Inspired by America Recycles Day, WSRA hosts Washington Recycles Every Day (WRED) events throughout the year, bringing professionals from all over Washington State together for discussion of recycling issues and behind-the-scenes tours of working facilities and technology demonstrations. Most of our events are currently virtual but we look forward to resuming some in-person events in the upcoming year.
Upcoming Events 2023
2023 WSRA Policy Forum
Date: December 12, 2023
Time: Tenatively 9:30 am – 12:00 pm
Location: Online via Zoom
Please join us for WSRA’s 2023 Policy Forum on Tuesday, December 12th tentatively from 9:30 AM-12:00 PM via Zoom! This virtual event is free for WSRA members, and offers an opportunity to hear directly from state legislators about upcoming legislation related to recycling, organics management, and waste reduction.
Speakers:
- Representative Beth Doglio
- Representative Liz Berry
- Janine Bogar
- Carolyn Bowie
- Patrick Merscher, Washington State Department of Ecology
Past Events: 2022-2023
WRED Webinar: Financing Zero Waste of Resources
Date: November 6, 2023
Time: 9:00 am – 10:00 am
Location: Online via Zoom
As the County moves toward zero waste of resources, a new revenue structure is needed to avoid large rate spikes due to dropping tonnage. This presentation will discuss the why, what and how King County moved away from the traditional per-ton fee structure most solid waste utilities use to a new approach that includes a fixed component.
Meet the Speakers:
John Walsh
Strategy and Performance Section Manager
King County Solid Waste Division
John Walsh is the Strategy and Performance Section Manager at King County Solid Waste Division and leads a team of people who work on rate and budget development, long term planning and performance management. He has over 10 years of experience in financial analysis, rate setting, and policy development. John started his career at King County in 2008 in the Roads Services Division, then moved to the Executive Office working for Performance, Strategy and Budget and has been with the Solid Waste Division since 2018. He has helped develop three different Solid Waste rate proposals, including two that introduced new concepts – a low-income discount for self-haul customers at division transfer stations and a restructure to add a fixed component to the traditional variable, per-ton rate structure.
Matt Hobson
Project Manager
FCS GROUP
Matt Hobson is a FCS GROUP project manager with 15 years of experience in financial and policy analysis for solid waste, water, wastewater, stormwater, and electric public utilities. He was worked with communities across the western U.S. to complete utility rate studies including cost-of-service analysis, rate design, financial forecasting, program evaluation, and strategic planning. He has worked in the industry since 2008 including roles with city and county governments.
WRED Webinar: Juno Technologies and King County Event
Date: September 26, 2023
Time: 9:30 am – 11:00 am
Location: Online via Zoom
Meet the Speakers:
David McConnell
National Commercial Development Director
Juno® Technology
In February 2023, King County, Washington began a 12-week mixed waste processing trial with waste recovery solution Juno® Technology at its Toledo, Oregon location. During the trial, Juno sorted, sanitized, and recovered recyclable materials from King County’s municipal solid waste. David McConnell, director, national commercial development, will share the results of the trial. King County will discuss how the first-of-its-kind technology fits into its Re+ initiative to achieve zero waste.
Morgan John
King County Project Manager
King County Solid Waste Division
In 2023, the King County Solid Waste Division launched Re+, with a goal to reduce landfilled waste by 70% by 2030. As part of Re+, the County is investigating mixed waste processing to capture and divert valuable resources from garbage. The County partnered with Georgia-Pacific to evaluate their mixed waste processing facility, called Juno.
WRED Event: WSRA Recompose Tour
Date: September 18, 2023
Time: 3:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Location: Recompose Seattle – 4 S Idaho St, Seattle, WA 98134 (Get Directions)
Join WSRA for a tour of Recompose, a licensed full-service funeral home offering human composting!
While in architecture school in 2011, Recompose founder Katrina Spade began thinking about updating contemporary death care practices with a sustainable alternative, one that would nourish the land rather than take away from it. After years of extensive research with green death care experts, ecologists, biologists, legislators, and more, human composting emerged. It’s been legal in Washington State since 2019 and is now legal in six other states as well.
In this 60-minute tour experience, you’ll see Recompose’s ceremony and community spaces as well as a portion of the vessel array in the Greenhouse, where human composting takes place. During the walk-through, you’ll learn about our history, values, goals, and the Recompose human composting process. The tour concludes with a seated Q&A session.
Washington Recycles Every Day
June 12, 2023 | Topic: Coffee Chat: Continuing the Conversation – 2023 Conference Chat
43rd Annual WSRA Conference & Tradeshow
May 21–24, 2023 | Yakima Convention Center | Yakima, WA
WSRA January WRED: Morning Mingle
January 5, 2023 | 10:00 AM – 11:00 AM
Join the WSRA for an informal morning mingle created for members to network online with peers from public and private sectors across WA State. The goal of this WRED event is to expand our member’s social networks for the coming year!
Wrapped Up in Plastic Film – The Obstacles to Collecting, Opportunities to Recycle, and Policy Surrounding Plastic Bags and Film Collections
Date: February 27, 2023
Time: 9:00 AM – 10:30 AM
This exciting WRED event features perspectives across the plastic film spectrum! We’ll hear about the challenges this notorious tangler poses at MRFs, the State’s upcoming Recycle Right campaign focused on keeping plastic film out of curbside bins and current implementation of the Bag Ban & BYOBag campaign, current recycling pathways from TREX, and efforts to advocate for new policies to reduce plastic pollution. At the end of the presentations, we’ll have time for questions and discussion.
2022 WSRA Policy Forum
December 19, 2022 | 9:00 am – 11:40 am | Online via Zoom
WSRA’s 2022 Policy Forum on Monday, December 19th from 9:00 AM-11:40 AM via Zoom! This virtual event is free forWSRA members, and offers an opportunity to hear directly from state legislators about upcoming legislation related to recycling, organics management, and waste reduction.
Legislators will present on the bills that they are planning to sponsor for the upcoming legislative session. This includes: Rep. Amy Walen (48th District), Rep. Mia Gregerson (33rd District), Sen. Christine Rolfes (23rd District) and Rep. Liz Berry (36th District), Sen. Derek Stanford (1st District) and more. Then, Ecology staff will present on implementation of recent legislation including organics management, postconsumer Recycled Content, and plastic bag ban and food serviceware opt in.
November WRED Event: Tips for Being an Effective Communicator in Olympia
November 17, 2022 | 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm | Online via Zoom
With the 2023 Legislative Session fast approaching, join WSRA’s Policy Committee to hear from experienced professionals about how to be an effective communicator in Olympia! You will learn more about the legislative process, key dates, important terms, and how to frame your talking points to get your message across to legislators.
Speakers Include:
Becky Bogard is the managing member of Bogard & Johnson LLC. Her clients include businesses and advocacy groups. Becky was Legislative Counsel in Governor Booth Gardner’s transition team and practiced law with the Preston Thorgrimson firm. Prior to moving to Seattle in 1979, she lobbied for several electric utility trade associations in Washington, D.C.
Becky received a BA in Economics from Duke University and a law degree from American University.
Ms. Bogard is a member of the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce and the Association of Washington Business. She is on the board of the Seattle Theatre Group. She is also a member of the Washington State Major League Baseball Public Facilities District.
Brad Lovaas is the Executive Director of the Washington Refuse and Recycling Association (WRRA), and has served in that role since 2002. Prior to WRRA, Brad worked for the Washington State Legislature for 20 years in several policy and fiscal staff positions, including Budget Coordinator for the Legislative Transportation Committee and the Senate Transportation Committee. He is a life-long Washington resident, UW Graduate and lives in Thurston County.
Heather has more than 25 years of experience in environmental work ranging from Zero Waste to toxic chemicals and habitat issues. At Zero Waste Washington, her focus has been on reducing upstream sources of waste and addressing downstream impacts, getting toxic chemicals out of products, eliminating plastic pollution, and building on the organization’s signature producer responsibility policy initiatives. Previously, at Futurewise, she worked to prevent runoff from entering our waterways and improve shoreline management practices and policies. Heather was at People for Puget Sound for over ten years where she focused on protections for the marine environment. Earlier, she was staff scientist for the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers Watershed Council and worked for the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board on water quality standards, regulatory permits, pollution assessments, greening the LA rivers and habitat renewal.
Batteries: The Positives, Negatives, & Everything In-Between!
October 24, 2022 | 9:00 am – 11:30 am | Online via Zoom
Back by popular demand, this WRED event will take an in-depth exploration of battery recycling.
Speakers represent a range of technical experts in the battery recycling world and will illustrate:
- The operational challenges of collecting and handling batteries, from facility fires to humanitarian issues
- An overview of battery types, chemistries, and recycling technologies available
- Legislative initiatives at the national level and a preview for Washington’s next battery bill
- Technical recycling process and tour from a Lithium Ion and EV battery recycler
- The challenges and best practices for transportation and firecode regulations.
WSRA WRED Presents: Equity in Action – In the Recycling World
September 29, 2022 | 1:00 pm – 2:00 pm | Online via Zoom
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, or DEI is a prominent initiative in many of our organizations – including the WSRA! Join us to hear case studies from two racial equity practitioners who are putting those equity principles into action.
Sam Keller from Seattle Public Utilities will share about Seattle’s Community Connections work. Sam is a senior community partnerships planner at SPU who focuses on equitable community engagement. Community Connections is a program that focuses on creating deep and sustainable partnerships that aim to improve the quality of life for people of color, immigrant, and low-income communities through transformative approaches and experiences. The program is currently engaged with Chinese Information Service Center, Horn of Africa Services, and ECOSS.
Sully Moreno is a community engagement and racial equity consultant who has worked extensively on solid waste projects. Her consulting practice is called Culture Shift Consulting. She will share about her work creating and facilitating a community panel for the King County Solid Waste Division Re+ program. Re+ focuses on reducing waste going to the landfill, and the community panel leans on their lived and professional experience to share recommendations for implementing Re+ strategies in ways that advance equity and benefit community members.
August WRED Coffee Chat: Do You Know Ridwell?
August 17, 2022
At this event, SRA members joined to network and to hear from Erin Gagnon on how Ridwell is sustainably reusing, recycling and empowering neighbors and communities to build a less wasteful future.
Sponsored by Ridwell
WSRA’s 42nd Annual Conference & Trade Show
May 15th -18th, 2022
The WSRA Conference and Trade Show is a showcase for the latest recycling, re-use, and waste reduction programs, technology and brings together around 200 industry leaders to learn, connect, inspire, and be inspired.
WRED: Plastic Conversion with Mura and Return to Polymers
Monday, April 25, 2022
David Foell, President & CEO of Return Polymers, and John Cozens, President of Mura North America, will speak about their respective organization’s solutions to what have historically been very challenging materials in the waste stream. The discussion will revolve around these companies’ solutions for various plastics and rigid PVC products (windows, siding, fencing, and pipe). These are end-markets that have not existed in the Pacific Northwest previously, so there are bound to be some great questions and discussions. We look forward to seeing you all there!
WRED: Ink Cartridge Recycling
Wednesday, February 23, 2022
Join us as we learn the three types of toner cartridges available to the market today: OEM, Remanufactured, and New Compatible. After explaining the difference on those we will then highlight the environmental impact these three cartridges create and how the raw materials of each can reused, if at all.
WRED: Networking Coffee Chat
Wednesday, January 5, 2022
This was a complimentary networking chat over a morning cup of coffee or tea, along with making new connections or reconnecting folks who haven’t spoken to each other in a while.
2021 Fall Policy Forum
Thursday, December 2, 2021
Presentations from the speakers of this virtual event:
Harris Battery Extended Producer Responsibility KHT 12.2.2021
Jones WSRA-ECY-Fall Policy Forum Presentation
Methane Gas Davina Duerr DRAFT Dec 2 2021 v2
Methane Gas Davina Duerr DRAFT Dec 2 2021 v3
WRED: Packaging EPR 101
Monday, November 22, 2021
Here is a look into the bread and butter of Packaging Extended Producer Responsibility as speakers provide us with Packaging EPR 101 followed by Q&A and discussion to shed light on what EPR is and what it is not.
WRED: Fall Coffee Chat
Wednesday, October 20th, 2021
This was a complimentary networking chat over a morning cup of coffee or tea, along with making new connections or reconnecting folks who haven’t spoken to each other in a while.
WRED’s Food Scraps Cooking Class with The Zero Waste Chef, Anne-Marie Bonneau
Tuesday, August 17th, 2021
Cookbook author, blogger, fermenter and sourdough baker Anne-Marie Bonneau has lived plastic-free since 2011. Through social media, her blog and her book, The Zero-Waste Chef: Plant-Forward Recipes and Tips for a Sustainable Kitchen and Planet, Anne-Marie shows others how reducing their trash not only benefits the planet but also satisfies their taste buds, improves their well-being and boosts their bank accounts. A Canadian transplant, she lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
WRED’s Paint Stewardship Webinar
Thursday, July 15, 2021
The State of Washington launched the new Paint Stewardship Program through Paint Care in April 2021. By encouraging households and businesses to recycle paint and making free and convenient drop-off locations, Paint Care hopes to increase the amount of paint reused, recycled or safely disposed of. After it is collected it must be transported and disposed of safely. ACT enviro is going to tell you about how they can help you to manage the paint. ACT enviro is a Paint Care approved hauler in the state of WA.
Thank you to our generous sponsors, Northwest Product stewardship Council, Anne-Marie Bonneau and Washington State Department of Ecology. Are you a recycling business or organization wanting to reach an audience of Washington recyclers? Contact us to discuss speaker and sponsorship options.
