Car seat recycling offered in Strathmore

Miriam Ostermann
Times Associate Editor

 

A former Strathmore resident is introducing her forward-thinking car-seat-recycling company to her hometown by partnering up with H&H Huxted Enterprises, therefore providing the community with another recycling opportunity, keeping thousands of seats out of the landfills, and slowly inching closer to having legislation in the future.
Melanie Risdon-Betcher launched Kidseat Recyclers Inc., the only car seat recycling company in Canada, just over five years ago in Calgary. Now averaging between 60 to 100 seats a month for a total of 4,422 since its conception, the small-scale company experienced increases in item drop-offs and hosted events. Through its efforts, the company has already diverted 30,954 lbs of plastic and metal from the landfills.
However, in partnering up with Huxted as a drop-off location, Kidseat Recyclers is expanding into Strathmore, with the hope that one day legislation will include a recycling levy in the purchase price of the safety devices.
“We’re very far from an efficient recycling program for car seats specifically, and it would be nice to sort of get it into the same logistical flow as say recycling tires,” said Risdon-Betcher. “I run this business part time and I really have not had the time to do the leg work involved in finding funding and grants. Eventually we would like to get some form of support like other recycling initiatives, and potentially lessen hat levy or do away with it all together. That’s the goal to eventually get there. It would require getting some legislation in place … but we’re just not there yet.”
Citizens are currently charged a $10 levy of which $4.20 is used for charges to transport seats to their facility and strip them, $3 towards administration, insurance, and website maintenance of Kidseat Recyclers, and $2.80 to pick up and transport seats from drop off locations.
On average, one child will require a minimum of three such devices – bucket, toddler, and booster seat. According to a recent census, 848 children under the age of 10 currently live in Strathmore.
For Christine Huxted, who is in charge of marketing at the recycle yard, the passion to partner with the initiative stemmed from her recent experiences as a new mom.
“It’s just another thing, with a new mom and lots of small kids in our group of friends and family, realizing how many car seats one kid goes through and that those all end up in the landfills,” she said. “It’s just finding another thing we can pull out of our landfill. I see how many do come in and know that they just go to the landfill and pile up.”
Transport Canada states, depending on the manufacturer, a car seat expiration ranges from six to 10 years. Because the plastic is affected by the hot and cold temperatures of the seasons, once past its expiration date, the plastic of a safety device may not be turned into a safety device again. This is due to the breaking down and molding of the plastic affecting the predictability of the material and allowing it to become more brittle.
“A safety device once recycled will always be a lesser product,” said Ridson-Betcher. “They’re huge, they’re big, it’s a lot of plastic and quite a bit of metal that will take thousands and thousands of years to degrade in a landfill. Plus it’s an oil by-product, so technically that will be leaching into wherever it’s decomposing for the next however many years. It’s a pollutant at the end of its life.”
Residents are asked to strip the material off the seats before dropping them off at the appropriate locations, and will need to pay the $10 levy fee.
The public is now able to drop off their used or expired car seats at the H&H Huxted recycle yard.