The City of Toronto has set the goal to be an international leader of innovative and sustainable waste management utilities. Manager of Circular Economy and Innovation, Meaghan Davis, shares how Toronto will make that goal a reality.
Olivia sits down with City of Toronto's Manager of Circular Economy and Innovation, Meaghan Davis. Toronto has been fostering a circular approach to many facets of its operations and as cities across the globe pay increasing attention to how their services either harm or help the environment, going for circularity is key. Olivia and Meaghan dive into Toronto's bold vision for a sustainable future, and how you may be able to incorporate more sustainable practices in your own local government.
Featured government: City of Toronto, Canada
Episode guests: Meaghan Davis, BA, MPL - Manager of Circular Economy and Innovation
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Lindsay: (00:05)
Welcome to the Govlaunch podcast. Govlaunch is the Wiki for local government innovation and on this podcast, we're sharing the stories of local government innovators and their efforts to build smarter governments. I'm Lindsay Pica-Alfano, co-founder of Govlaunch and your host. Today, Olivia sits down with City of Toronto's manager of circular economy and innovation, Meaghan Davis. Toronto has been fostering a circular approach to many facets of its operations and as cities across the globe pay increasing attention to how their services either harm or help the environment, going for circularity is key. I'll turn now to Olivia to dive into Toronto's bold vision for a sustainable future, and how you may be able to incorporate more sustainable practices in your own local government.
Olivia: (00:59)
Hi, I'm Olivia from Govlaunch and I'm here with Meaghan Davis from the City of Toronto. Meaghan, tell us a little about yourself.
Meaghan: (01:06)
Hi, um, I am Meaghan Davis from the circular economy and innovation team at the city of Toronto. And our unit is based in the solid waste management services division at the city for people who don't know Toronto, we are Canada's largest city. We're the fourth largest in north America and home to a diverse population of 2.9 million people. And we're a global center for business, finance, arts and culture, but what people may not be familiar with is that we also operate one of the most comprehensive, integrated waste management systems in North America. We manage, uh, almost 800,000 tons of waste per year, and we have a goal to be an international leader as an innovative and sustainable waste management utility. And that vision of innovation and sustainability is really at the core of what we do on the circular economy and innovation team.
Olivia: (01:51)
Wonderful. So we'll delve into all of that in just a moment. And as you mentioned, your work focus is primarily on fostering a circular economy. Before we go any further, can you describe to our listeners what is a circular economy exactly?
Meaghan: (02:05)
Sure. And one of the easiest ways that I like to explain a circular economy to people who aren't familiar is to start with what it isn't. When you look at the waste that you produce at home, um, what's going into your garbage bin every week. What you're seeing is the results of a linear economic model, or what's sometimes called a take, make and dispose economy. So we take raw materials like wood and water and minerals from the planet. We make stuff out of those materials, often things that aren't designed to last for very long. And then when we're done with it, we throw the garbage out. Circular economy thinking is all about challenging us to take less, to make better and to give back to the planet and our natural systems. So we wanna disrupt those linear economic processes by adopting models of design of production and of consumption that keep resources in use for as long as possible in order to reduce waste and to reduce human impact on the planet. So whether we're talking about household goods, like your cell phones or your clothes, or if we're talking about major infrastructure projects, like what we deliver in government circular economy approaches can help us to reduce our reliance on non-renewable resources, minimize our carbon footprint, maximize the use of goods and services and regenerate the ecosystem systems that we rely on. So really in a circular economy, we're trying to design economic and human activity to support the health of natural systems and contribute to thriving and sustainable communities.
Olivia: (03:31)
So it's pretty obvious from what you just shared that cities would play a huge role in this space as the lead, when it comes to waste management services. So when we think about waste specifically, and from your perspective, how have you seen cities shift to become more sustainable and really become leaders in this circular economy space?
Meaghan: (03:49)
I think especially as it relates to climate change and environmental impact, we're really seeing waste get embedded in a lot of city climate action strategies and especially a growing focus on the issue of organic waste and the importance of diverting organic waste from landfill in order to reduce landfill gas emissions often of met. So for example, in Toronto, we've been investing in a really robust green bin organics program. And in fact, we've been diverting organic waste from landfill for almost 20 years through state-of-the-art anaerobic digestion facility in Toronto, we offer organic diversion to all of our customers. So whether they live in a single family home or a multi residential home, and we're increasingly seeing cities around the world, focusing on expanding organic diversion into multi residential customer bases, because that can be really important, especially as cities grow and densify and are often growing up, we wanna make sure that diversion is being offered to all people who are generating organic waste.
Meaghan: (04:44)
I think in waste, you're also increasingly seeing a focus on, uh, trying to maximize the use of organic resources by generating green fuels. That's something we're doing in Toronto. We've recently invested in technology that's allowing us to, uh, generate renewable natural gas from our green bin program and that's helping us to reduce carbon emissions across city operations, because we'll be able to use that gas to power city fleet vehicles and to heat our facilities. Cities have a lot of mechanisms to reduce waste and to combat climate change because we're major purchasers with goods, we design buildings and infrastructure, and of course we have regulatory frameworks, but especially on issues, waste and circular economy. I think we're also recognizing that government action alone, isn't going to work, that we need really strategic partnerships and means to collaborate with business with industry and with community. So I think we're increasingly seeing strategies for waste circular economy and environmental sustainability that are focusing on building those networks to work towards these shared goals. And that includes networks of cities working together on these issues.
Olivia: (05:48)
Now that we've set the stage, I wanna start at the beginning. When did the city of Toronto first start thinking about becoming a circular economy advocate and champion?
Meaghan: (05:59)
It's an interesting question because I would argue to lots of my colleagues that circular economy principles have really been at the core of what they've done for decades now, especially the focus on recovering resources from waste and managing the climate impact of our system. Um, but the explicit goal for the city of Toronto to work towards zero waste in a circular economy was set in 2016. And that's when our Toronto city council adopted Toronto's long term waste management strategy. And that strategy guides our waste management planning in Toronto over the next 30 to 50 years, the strategy looks at policies and programs focusing on the waste hierarchy that you might be familiar with. So really prioritizing reduction and reuse, and then recycling and recovery, and of course, strategies for residual disposal. And we wanna make sure that those are all environmentally sustainable, as well as socially acceptable and, uh, cost effective. This through the long term waste management strategy. There was a recommendation to create a dedicated business unit for advancing our circular city work and that's the circular economy and innovation team. Um, but now our circular city ambitions have been reinforced in several different city of Toronto priority strategies, including our resilient strategy, our, uh, digital infrastructure plan, which is currently a draft form. And most importantly, in our net zero strategy, which is emphasized the need to improve sustainable consumption and circularity, not just city operations, but across the whole economy.
Olivia: (07:21)
So it's interesting that circular economy principles are not just in your waste management plan, but rather spans a lot of different areas across the city. So likely your projects. And we'll get into that in just a moment are embedded in lots of different areas within the city. How is your work funded?
Meaghan: (07:42)
Yeah, it's an interesting question. Um, and it's something that we reflect on quite a lot when we're thinking about the long term, uh, opportunities with the circular economy portfolio. So my unit, uh, as I mentioned, is based in the solid waste management services division and our waste division is rate funded. So what that means is that our whole integrated waste management system from the infrastructure and facilities that we operate to our public education programs and our staffing, that's all funded by a utility bill for garbage collection. And in fact, the rate-based program is key, not just to our financial sustainability, but also to our environmental sustainability because our customer pay fees for their garbage services based on the size of their garbage bin. So there's an incentive to reduce the amount of waste you're generating and to divert as much as possible from landfill, because the more you divert, the less you pay. Municipal finance wants in your audience will know that user fees are really transparent and fair way to finance municipal services, where there's private good component, where as a user, you can control your use of a service.
Meaghan: (08:45)
But I think one of the interesting tensions that is emerging on the circular economy portfolio, especially through our study of the best practices that we're seeing globally what's happening in other cities. And the kind of ambition that we've been signaling in Toronto is that many of the circular economy outcomes that we wanna achieve, as well as the actions that will be necessary to achieve those outcomes aren't just tied to our waste utility. And in fact, in the longer term, we might be pursuing broader social goods, things that are less tied to the integrative waste management system that are more broadly about what's happening in the community. So I, I won't pretend to have the answers to resolve that tension, but it means that governance is really important when we're thinking about the long-term sustainment of these complex programs like circular economy. Um, and I'm sure many people who work in sustainability and climate action would find that familiar as well.
Olivia: (09:35)
So how has your team just unpacking the piece on governance a little bit further? How has your team brought together different leaders across the city across different operational areas to come together and really work as a whole in terms of thinking about circular economy strategies within the city?
Meaghan: (09:54)
When our long term waste management strategy was adopted, there was a recommendation to form a cross divisional working group that represented different functions at the city. And that would provide input towards creating a, a strategy and policy framework for circular economy. Um, so that was an early action that was taken on in particular at the start big focus on bringing in the infrastructure teams, because a lot of regular economy best practice has been really focused on infrastructure delivery, waste management resource consumption. And so when you think about those topics, you think about waste. You think about water, you think about transportation. Over the past couple of years, one of the major projects that we've been looking at has been a study we've called baselining for us, circular Toronto. And that was a project that we ran starting in 2020. It just wrapped up last year.
Meaghan: (10:43)
And it was really looking at assessing our current state of circular economy in Toronto. Where are we, what is our regulatory framework? What are the opportunities and what are some of the barriers that we need to, to address if we wanna B build a circular city that study also allowed us to do a bit of a deep dive into some major economic sectors, looking at how materials are consumed, how resources are flowing through those sectors, and then what does recovery and final disposal look like? And I think through the development of that study, what we've observed is that the opportunities again and where there is action in the, especially in local businesses and neighborhood level action, that that's really expanding beyond just the infrastructure perspective into a lot of different areas. So there's interesting work happening in the retail spaces in Toronto, in the food system.
Meaghan: (11:31)
And so one of our, our really important next steps as we work towards developing a strategy and policy framework for circular, our economy in Toronto, is to build a new governance model to ensure that as we pursue the kind of regulatory change that's going enable and empower people in community and industry to adopt circular practices and business models. And as we look to our own city services and how we can refine those to be more circular, to reduce waste, to reduce our environmental impact, we wanna ensure that that's sustainable over the long term. And so that governance model is really important. And that's something that we're looking at right now, making sure that we have the right people at the table to not just inform our work, but to make sure that it's lasting in the long term.
Olivia: (12:12)
Thanks for that. The governance piece seems to be a really important, critical success factor for the work that you and your team are doing. Can you share with our audience something practical, tangible that you're working on this circular economy space right now?
Meaghan: (12:26)
Definitely. So one of the things that we're realizing is really important in order to advance our circular economy transformation internally is capacity building and making sure that staff understand what are strategic objectives and how are they relevant to my work. And one of the ways in which we can ensure that the circular economy portfolio touches staff across the city is through procurement in cities around the world. Procurement is really being recognized as a key urban policy leader to make our practices more sustainable, as well as to encourage sustainable innovation in the private sector. Because we have lots of purchasing power that we can use to show demand for the supply of sustainable and circular and climate friendly goods and services. So the city of Toronto in 2018 put together a circular procurement framework that would help guide how circular economy principles can be embedded into our procurement practices.
Meaghan: (13:22)
And one of the things that we're working on right now is a suite of online training modules that will be available to city staff across our full corporation. So all 40 something divisions that will help to explain not just the principles of circular economy, but what those mean when put into practice in the context of procurement. And what we're really excited about is that procurement is something that touches basically every municipal employee's life in one way or another. And I think procurement is a mechanism that regardless of your function at this city, whether you or a junior employee, or one of the most senior executives, it is a way that your day to day work practice can feed into broader city strategic priorities. So we're working on a suite of modules that are both technical, you know, talking about the circular economy, what it means to embed these principles in procurement, but also hopefully modules that are gonna be inspired and excite people to embed sustainability and climate action into their purchasing practices.
Olivia: (14:24)
It sounds like a big part of your work is tied to organizational change and transformation as well. And often we find where there's exciting change. There's often innovation that follow suit. Have there been any interesting innovations that your team has come across service help develop through your work in the circular economy space?
Meaghan: (14:42)
Yeah, there's a lot of really exciting companies that are working in kind of the tech space. That's making us kind of rethink how we can offer municipal services in a different way or how we can leverage our assets to deliver really interesting and innovative benefits at the city there. One of the pilot projects that our team worked on a couple of years ago was in partnership with a company called Rubicon. And what we were trying to do was explore how, uh, our garbage trucks could be leveraged as kind of mobile data collection units. In partnership with Rubicon, we installed cameras on a couple of our garbage trucks and through a machine learning process, we were training these cameras to recognize functions in the urban environment that we wanted to potentially target and study. So in this exam, what we wanted to understand was can we train these cameras to identify our garbage bins, to identify when there's overflow, when there's potentially contamination and especially our recycling bins, cuz that's a big issue for us.
Meaghan: (15:47)
And it was a really interesting exploration to see a, how can we use our garbage, it's not just to collect garbage, but to generate information that we can use to inform our programs and the way that we work with our customers to provide our services. And also, you know, what does that mean operationally do, what does it mean to install these kind, this kind of technology on a vehicle like ours in an urban environment that's different than other places where these cameras have been trained. It's a really interesting pilot. We learned a lot from it. Um, and I'm really excited to see what comes next because I think that there are some new opportunities that became apparent as we worked through that pilot that, uh, will be, uh, very interesting for the city of Toronto explore in the next few years.
Olivia: (16:29)
So you've shared with our listeners, a couple of projects. I'd be curious to learn more about what types of metrics are typically used to keep track of the impact of these projects.
Meaghan: (16:42)
Yeah, it's a really good question. And it's the question of metrics and indicators for the circular economy is actually creating a lot of conversation in circular economy spaces, not just in Toronto, but globally. When you think about the principles of a circular economy, things like limiting the use of natural resources, maximizing the use of materials. There isn't a single easy metric that helps all kinds of actors measure progress in the way that measuring greenhouse gas emissions as CO2 equivalence is a really clear to measure climate impact and enable comparability between different jurisdictions and strategies. In our research on circular economy indicators, we've observed that there isn't really consensus on what a circular economy strategy should be and therefore how you would measure the impact of that work. And we've seen a lot of indicators that tend to fall under an UN environmental umbrella, even when we're seeing shifts away from material waste strategies, to look at things that are more holistic, like ecological boundaries and social wellbeing goals.
Meaghan: (17:44)
Um, and we've also seen that a lot of circular economy indicators are data-driven rather than outcome driven. So you'll see a lot of focus on measuring waste flows and the generation of waste as opposed to metrics that help us see the closing of loops, which is really a, a better indicator of whether, uh, an intervention has been successful on a circular basis. So that's a challenge in the global community, a circular economy, academics and industry leaders. And you know, that's not something that we can resolve in the city's circular economy portfolio. So what we're really focusing on, especially as we work towards developing a roadmap for circular economy in Toronto, is we wanna be really clear about the goals that we're setting and allow those goals and the outcomes that we're trying to achieve to inform the indicators that we're gonna use to measure progress.
Meaghan: (18:32)
So for example, in our baseline study, we didn't just want to measure the current state of circularity in Toronto. We wanted to end with a set of sort of aspirational goals that help us to understand what being a circular city could mean for Toronto to try to help, to align stakeholders behind some of the potential opportunities for our city and for each of those goal statements that we put forward. We developed a matching set of indicators that we think could be useful to measure progress. For example, one of our goals, uh, set out in our baseline study was that Toronto could be sustaining a robust system of reuse repair and donation and to measure progress towards that one example is we could be looking at the percentage of neighborhoods with a tool library or a repair hub in it. I know that those types of indicators aren't necessarily gonna enable comparability between jurisdictions and strategies, but for our purposes as a municipal government, um, focusing on outcomes first and allowing indicators to flow from that is a really important way us to ensure we're being accountable to the communities that we're serving, that we're delivering impact through our circular economy portfolio.
Meaghan: (19:37)
And really importantly, that we're communicating that impact to the public. So they know what they're investing in
Olivia: (19:43)
Public accountability is incredibly important, especially when we think of large scale systems change such as transitioning to the circular economy. What has been, you've shared with us a lot of really great insights into some of your projects, the governance piece, the budgeting, when we think about the city of Toronto's transition to a fully circular economy, what, in your opinion has been the biggest obstacle, what is still left to do?
Meaghan: (20:10)
Yeah, I think one of the biggest to obstacles to be quite honest is how big that transformation is often the circular economy transition can feel particularly overwhelming, especially when you think about the number of stakeholders that have to be lined up in order to, as you say, get to that systemic level of transformation. And I think opportunities for the circular economy are going to look very different depending on what sector it is that you're targeting, how advanced the technology is in that sector, market readiness, consumer demand. And of course the legislation of the regulatory constraints. So I think for municipal governments, one of the biggest obstacles is really just the scale of that transformation. It can be tough to know where to start and when a transformation is, is so big and so broad, if you're not really focusing on defining what that means, it can be really challenging to line stakeholders up towards a kind of coherent set of next steps in a focus direction.
Meaghan: (21:10)
But what I try to tell myself when I'm feeling particularly overwhelmed by the, the scale of transformation that we're we're thinking about on the circular economy is that I think that what makes it challenging is also the huge opportunity in the circular economy, what we've observed in our work and in the level of involvement that we've had, not just across city of Toronto divisions, but from members of the community that wanna be part of our work is that the circular economy is really an opportunity for silo busting because it needs the input of so many cross-functional cross disciplinary contributors. I think that innovation often, and for a long time has meant specializing in a specific area, getting really good at something really technical and in a lot of instances, that is exactly the kind of innovation that's needed. But I think with complex problems like circular economy, like climate change, innovation really comes through synthesis by bringing together a lot of different people and throwing a lot of different, good, smart ideas into the mix. So while that itself can be a challenge, it can be overwhelming and it can be hard to organize a lot of people. That's also really, really exciting. And I think it's those dynamic spaces where you have lots of different enthusiastic people coming together where the most exciting world it comes through and the most interesting work as well. So I would say the scale of the transformation is both the challenge and the opportunity when we're thinking about the circular economy,
Olivia: (22:38)
Your passion for this important transition is evident. So what advice would you share to local governments looking to start their circular economy journeys?
Meaghan: (22:47)
I think first and foremost, it's really, really important to set clear goals. When you're thinking about being a circular city, the vision for circularity really needs to be place based. It needs to be rooted in your local cultures, in your local economies, in your local ecosystems. And having a clear set of goals will help you to keep focus and to line people up behind that goal. The second thing and related is invest in your people, resources, transformation doesn't happen off the side of the desk. So it's really important if you're serious about building a circular city to get the staff in place who are motivated to drive this work forward to line up your senior leadership champions who are not just the set until to get the work off the ground, but who are critical to sustain it in the long term. And then I'd say the third thing would be learn to tell your stories.
Meaghan: (23:39)
Um, I think especially in North America where the words circular economy aren't as familiar as they are in, uh, terms like Europe, the work can come across as technocratic and, and that can be a bit of a turnoff. It, it might feel like it's not for everyone. And I don't think that's the case because a circular economy is fundamentally a human economy and you need people participating in it. So learning to tell your story, get people excited, celebrate the local wins and the local innovations. I think that that's really, really important. I think we sometimes underestimate the value of storytelling when we're working in a bureaucracy and I would say, uh, really lean into that, um, and really lean into, um, yeah, no, I'll, I'll leave it at that
Olivia: (24:22)
Storytelling, such an important element of transformation and of getting people excited for change. So thanks for sharing that. Meaghan, shifting gears a bit, and you mentioned at the start, there's tons of other cities thinking about if they transition to circular economies, do you know of any other standout innovation in this space in another local authority that you think we should check out?
Meaghan: (24:44)
Yeah. I really wanna highlight the word of circular Cleveland, which is a partnership between the city government and several nonprofits working at the community level. And what I think is really exciting about their work is that they're centering racial justice and wealth redistribution in their circular economy strategies traditionally, and through our research, we've observed that many circular economy strategies sort of take for granted that social outcomes will necessarily or automatically follow from economic or environmental investment. And I think Cleveland's work is really challenging that assumption. And I think that what they're going to accomplish over the next few months and years is gonna be a really interesting case study and how to build a circular economy with equity at it's core. So I'll definitely be watching their work.
Olivia: (25:31)
Great. Watch that space. Lastly, what's something that excites you about the future of civic innovation in Toronto.
Meaghan: (25:39)
I think what is most exciting about what's happening in Toronto right now is how much energy there is to work towards some really transformative change. And as an example, I wanna highlight that when staff brought forward our net zero strategy last fall for Toronto city council to explore and debate something like 78 people lined up to deliver reputations to show their support for the strategy on top of all of the people who wrote letters and provided submissions. I think that's an incredible number of people who wanted to take time out from their work day, from their school day to show up and say, this is important to me. How can I be part of this work? And that's something we've seen on the circular economy portfolio as well. Um, we had the great privilege to work over the past three years with our circular economy working group, which was a group of over 40 business and community activists and leaders who are working to advance a circular economy in all kinds of different spaces in Toronto at the local level, they came forward and met with us quarterly to provide input on our work, to provide advice and to keep us going, which was really important over the past two years during the pandemic, when the work has certainly been a challenge, as I'm sure many have experienced to have that many people lined up behind your work and believing in the value that it can deliver and wanting it to be a success that kind of energy is so, so, so inspiring and it helps keep us going.
Meaghan: (27:12)
So I think really the future of civic innovation is bright in Toronto. There is so much momentum and so many great ideas that we as a city government can build upon. And I'm really excited to learn. We can continue to unlock that innovation in the years to come as we work, to develop our circular economy strategy
Olivia: (27:29)
While we're looking forward to seeing more cities celebrating and championing circularity. So this is great news. The future is certainly bright. Thanks for joining us, Megan.
Meaghan: (27:39)
Thanks so much for having me.
Lindsay: (27:50)
I'm Lindsay Pica-Alfano and this podcast was produced by Govlaunch, the Wiki for local government innovation. You can subscribe to hear more stories like this, wherever you get your podcasts. If you're a local government innovator, we hope you'll help us on our mission to build the largest free resource for local governments globally. You can join to search and contribute to the wiki@govlaunch.com. Thanks for tuning in. We hope to see you next time on the Govlaunch podcast.