While reading Kuhn's paper, my mind traveled to work...and back. The City of Calgary has launched a Food and Yard Waste pilot program in four communities which runs for the next year. The goal is to decrease dependency on landfills and create a valuable product-compost-out of the organic material diverted through the program.
It's clear the "Green Cart" has been a controversial issue thus far in Calgary. Based on surveys conducted through a third party in the communities selected in the pilot program, 64% of those surveyed believed that organics broke down in the landfill. This is not the case. At least not at a rapid rate. The anaerobic conditions in a landfill cell lack the environment organics require to decompose.
I pulled the phrase "nature's failure to conform entirely to expectation" (Kuhn, 1962) out of the reading to remind myself that there is misinformation or a lack of education regarding organics in the landfill available to the general public in Calgary, and beyond. We expect nature to look after materials like grass, leaves, and food. Instead we are the failure in our waste management past. How can we encourage change?
(The photo is from a cell from the 1970s which has been excavated. We found green grass, newspapers, pine cones, cans, bottles, clothing, and all sorts of treasures from yesteryears).
