Construction and demolition waste (C&D) accounts for a colossal 30 percent of total waste produced globally. So if you’re contemplating a home renovation, you might now be wondering just what you’re going to do with all the construction debris you’re going to produce.
The good news is that there’s a lot you can do with it. By putting some thought and effort in you can find a home for a good chunk of it then recycle as much as possible of what remains.
DIY or Hiring a Professional
Much like the renovation process itself, when disposing of construction waste you have the choice of hiring a professional to handle everything, disposing of it yourself or finding a middle ground. If you don’t want to deal with any of the cleanup you can save time by hiring a haulage company to handle the job. They offer full service options where you don’t have to even handle anything, you just point out what you want picked up and they’ll take it all away. If you’re going this route you’ll want to hire a legitimate company to avoid the risk of coming across a shady enterprise that could dump illegally. Even with legitimate companies, you’ll want to ask what they’re going to recycle and what not.
While recycling construction debris yourself is the most cost-effective solution that also depends on how much time and effort you’re willing to spend on the job. If doing it yourself you could either go the full-on DIY route and truck all the waste to the recycling centre yourself or you could hire a dumpster and dump it in yourself then let them sort it out. Sorting the waste and disposing of it is time consuming and you have to know a few things because you could be handling hazardous materials that could be bad for your health. You’ll also need to know where to dispose of those hazardous materials.
If you’re working with contractors to do the renovation talk to them about how you want to handle the waste. What may be a priority for you may not be for them so it’s good to make sure you’re on the same page.
If you’re hiring a construction waste removal company to dispose of your debris, it’s still good to know about construction waste recycling because you’ll want to know what questions to ask them so you know you’re picking a company that is recycling as much as possible.
Before you start taking anything away for recycling, there are a few steps you can take to cut down on the amount of debris you’ll eventually have to haul, saving you both time and money, and resulting in less impact on the environment.
Reuse & Repurpose What You Can
This first step is about making your job easier while diverting waste in as beneficial a way as possible for the environment. The more you keep the less you’ll have to haul away and the less that enters landfill.
The pack rats reading this will appreciate knowing that they’d be environmentally justified in holding on to that old kitchen sink. Recovering pack rats, not so much.
But though that old kitchen sink won’t end up in landfill right away, it doesn’t do any good to hold on to a bunch of junk that you’ll never use. A better way to handle this is to think about ways to reuse your stuff elsewhere in your home. If you’re building a garden bar you could put your old kitchen sink to use there or you could use it in a laundry room or art studio.
If it’s a material that you wouldn’t use right away or have a definite plan to use in the near future, perhaps you could repurpose it. Think of the many ways you could repurpose a kitchen sink: as a bird bath, pet wash station, garden planter, water fountain in the garden. If you’re doing a huge reno there are a number of things you could possibly reuse right away that could contribute to your home. Have a look at this checklist and try to tick off a few boxes if you can.
Wood – If you’re into woodworking, you can use repurpose your old wood to make something useful like chairs or raised garden beds. If you have hardwood, you can refinish it and use it somewhere else in the house that could benefit from hardwood flooring.
Cabinetry – If you need some extra storage in your garage or storage room you can give your old cabinets a second life elsewhere in your home.
Doors – If you have a nice solid wooden door, even if it’s all beat up, it can be refinished to look great. Or perhaps you could use it as a tabletop or a headboard for a bed – buying wood like that is costly so it’s really worth thinking twice before tossing it.
Windows and mirrors – Remove the glass and voilà you have a nice picture frame. Or you can attach legs to it and use it as a coffee table. If you have a garden, windows are useful for making a cold frame or drying rack for your herbs.
Bricks – Use your old bricks as paving stones in your yard. It’s not hard to do. Just lay down some gravel and sand, flatten it out then lay out the bricks and add some more sand on top to lock them in.
Tiles – Turn your old tiles into a creative backsplash for your kitchen.
Those were just a few of the many reuse and repurposing ideas. Here’s a list of 900+ ideas on Pinterest that you can put to use. The possibilities are endless. It’s a fun way to get creative and can also be really fulfilling to come up with ways to create something useful or artistic out of something that was destined for the dump.
Resell for Some Extra Cash
I don’t think “resell” is on the ever-expanding list of Rs, but it should be. The internet has created more marketplaces to sell your old stuff than you’d care to count. And being a global medium, the number of people you can reach is massive. So don’t think that no one would want your junk. If you already have a Facebook, Ebay or Kijiji account you’re one step closer to selling your stuff. Pictures of used goods aren’t all that good so I wouldn’t get hung up on doing an extensive photo shoot for your old stuff. Just click a few quick pics and write up a basic description and you’re good to go.
The great part about going this route is that you get money back for your old things. You also don’t usually have to ship things out, which saves you that cost and hassle. And another potential bonus, especially for high-value items: you can ask the buyer to do the removal or demolition then you work that into the cost. Here’s an example. Marble countertops can cost $50-100 per sq. ft. With a material that costly, you can place an auction to sell your old countertop and you can state that they have to remove the countertop, saving you from having to disassemble it and transport it somewhere to be sold.
It’s not just the big sites that you can sell your used good on. You can sell on auction sites or at local auction houses. Here are a few you can check out:
Some of the items you’ll have the most luck selling used include appliances, furniture, countertops, stone tiles, light fixtures and doors. You may not get much for them, but something is better than nothing. And the best part is you don’t have to haul them away, saving you both time and money.
Donate to a Good Cause
Whatever you haven’t been able to reuse or resell, you can donate to local organizations.
Habitat for Humanity ReStores are a great place to donate as they accept a range of building materials that you’d have after a renovation. Aside from that there’s Goodwill, Salvation Army and other local thrift stores and charities that take donations. Some of these organizations will pick up your stuff, some require you to drop them off.
You can also take pictures of your things and list them for free pickup on sites like Facebook Marketplace, Kijiji, Craigslist and Freecycle. Though this option will take longer than dumping things off at a local organization, people will come pick them up from you so you don’t have to do anything other than list them and answer some messages.
Return Unused Building Materials
If you or your contractor overestimated the amount of materials you needed it doesn’t mean you’re stuck with them. Home improvement retailers have generous return policies so you can get a refund, exchange or store credit as long as the products are not damaged or custom made.
Home Depot, for example, will generally take products back with proof of purchase within 90 days of buying it or 365 days if you use their credit card, revolving charge or commercial account. One good thing about using the store’s credit card, revolving charge or commercial account is that you don’t need to worry about having your receipt – the store can look up your purchase for you.
But even if you didn’t use one of the above three options and you didn’t keep your receipt they may still be able to offer you store credit. In this case you’d need to provide your address and ID.
Recycling and Waste Recovery
So at this point you’ve reused, resold, donated and returned whatever you possibly could. The house is getting emptier, but you still have a pile of stuff. Now’s when you can get rid of all the rest by recycling then the remaining stuff will go to landfill.
Recycling technology has come a long way in recent years to the point that a good number of building materials can be recycled. That being said there are still a lot of things that cannot be recycled (or not easily recycled).
What is Recyclable and What Isn’t
Here’s a general list of the building materials that can be recycled and those that cannot. It will vary depending on the facilities as some things will be accepted, some won’t.
Recyclable – concrete, metal, wood (untreated lumber, plywood, pallets, OSB, furniture), asphalt, bricks, glass, drywall, fiberglass insulation and some types of plastic.
Non-recyclable – hazardous materials that contain asbestos (it was commonly used prior to 1980 in building materials such as ceiling and floor tiles, siding, paint and shingles); wood (treated, painted, stained, engineered, composite or with fasteners); adhesives; plaster; tiles and some types of plastic.
Waste Recovery
The technology is there to turn some of your trash into fuel. Though it’s more environmentally friendly to reuse or repurpose your stuff, converting it to fuel is also a viable option since that fuel will displace a certain amount of non-renewable fossil fuels that would otherwise have to be extracted.
Untreated wood is one particular material that’s a good candidate for waste recovery. It can be converted into biofuel, compost or mulch. If you have a fireplace or wood stove you can also burn it yourself to reduce your furnace usage in the winter.
How to Get Rid of It All
Unfortunately, getting rid of construction debris is not as convenient as putting it out on the road for the garbage truck to come pick up. It’s too big and bulky, and there’s a chance of there being hazardous waste so they don’t accept it.
For a home renovation you’re looking at either hiring a dumpster or bag, hauling it away yourself or hiring a company to handle it all. It will generally be commingled recycling so everything gets put in one container and it then gets sorted at a transfer station.
Disposing of Hazardous Waste
Building materials that are considered hazardous waste include asbestos, paint, fluorescent lights, adhesives, aerosol cans and treated wood. Certain materials like asbestos need to be handled by a professional since handling them can negatively impact your health. Refer to the federal government’s resources on hazardous waste for more information about hazardous waste.
For hazardous waste that you can handle safely, you’ll need to take it to specific places to dispose of it. The best way to find out where to dispose of hazardous waste is to do a search for something like “how to dispose of hazardous construction debris in (your city).” Doing that search for Vancouver serves up a really helpful tool where you can type in whatever material you want to dispose of and it’ll tell you where you can get rid of it.
Hire a Dumpster
One option to recycle your waste is to get a dumpster. There are various companies who will deliver a roll-off dumpster that you can fill up and they haul it away. They come in sizes from 10 to 40 cubic yards so you have a lot of choice based on how large a container you’ll need. You’ll want to check out their website and ask questions about their commitment to recycling your waste (some companies like Gorilla Bins guarantee that they will recycle 100 percent of the junk they haul).
You can rent dumpsters for extended periods of time from a few days to weeks, so you have time dumping things out as you renovate. But they’re large so depending on where you live you might have to park it on the road, which will block off valuable parking spaces and will require a big truck coming in and out to dump it off and pick it up.
Hire a Bag
If your remodelling project is minimal and you only have a small amount of waste you’ll need picked up, opt for a bag. You can fit up to about 3 cubic yards worth of stuff in them.
They take up a lot less space so you won’t piss off your neighbours, but the downside is that bags are more expensive than dumpsters given their relative size. They also have weight limits and since they’re not large, you’d be surprised how quickly you can fill one up. If you underestimate your waste removal needs, you might end up needing multiple bags and find yourself spending more.
Haul it Away Yourself
If you have a truck (or are willing to rent one) and you want to put in the time and effort, another option is to haul away your junk to recycling centres and salvage yards. Going this route you have more control over the recycling process, so you can recycle the highest percentage of your material as possible. That is especially true if you can’t find a waste removal company that will recycle your junk or you can’t find a reliable company where you live.
And doing it this way you can also get some money back by selling the more valuable materials like metal and high-quality wood. You might even have luck selling things like windows, doors and fixtures to architectural salvage companies.
Aside from municipal recycling centres, here’s a list of some salvage companies and demolition companies you can contact:
Western Canada
- Capital Salvage Company – BC
- Clearview Demolition – BC
- Alberta Mechanical – Alberta
- Salvage Solutions – Alberta
- W.I.L Demolition & Salvage – Saskatchewan
- Salvage Supermarket – Manitoba
Eastern Canada
- Koomans Demolition – Ontario
- PDI National Salvage – Ontario and Online
- Gagnon Demolition – Ontario and Online
- Quebec Aubaines Recycle – Quebec
- Renovators Resource – Nova Scotia
Hire a Waste Removal Company
This is the most convenient way to do things as you just need to point out your waste and they’ll come into the house, pick it up and get rid of it. It’ll cost you more, but you won’t have to deal with any of the physical labour or time required to rent a bin and dispose of it.
Aside from cost, the other downside is that it’s an all-at-once kind of thing. If you have an ongoing renovation and need to clear out your waste as you go, you probably won’t want to go down this route.
How to Correctly Size Your Container
Knowing what size container you need can be tricky because your stuff won’t fill up perfectly. There will be voids in the container that take up excess room. And it’s not just the size you’ll need to account for, there’s also a weight limit.
As a general rule of thumb, if you have a small cleanup or one-room renovation project, you can get by with a 10 or 12 yard dumpster. A 20 yard dumpster is a popular choice as it’s good for small demolition projects. If you have a large project like an addition or large scale demolition you’ll need something in the 30 to 40 yard range. Otherwise, if you have a really small project you can get by with a bag.
Now after going through all the previous steps hopefully that ton of trash dwindled down to a more manageable size and that you were able to recycle as much of the remaining amount as possible!
