A by-law of the City of Ottawa to provide for solid waste management and to repeal bylaw 2009-396.
Updated July 2019
Amending By-laws:
- By-law No. 2012-460
- By-law No. 2013-392
- By-law No. 2015-131
- By-law No. 2015-344
- By-law No. 2016-33
- By-law No. 2019-226
The Council of the City of Ottawa enacts as follows:
Section 1 - Definitions
In this by-law:
“additional services” means services required by the building owner whereby garbage and recyclable material are collected in front-end loading containers and require collection staff to enter a building, winch or manoeuvre the containers for any distance to the collection location;
“aerosol container” means a empty aerosol container, which falls within the meaning of the definition of “empty container” in the regulations made under the Environmental Protection Act;
“alternating weekly collection” means collection of the same material once every two weeks but linked to collection of another material every two weeks, where collection of the second material is offset from the first material by one week. An example would be the Blue Box one week and the Black Box the following week;
“aluminum foil” means a clean aluminum containers such as pie plates, tart containers, TV dinner trays, roasters, and household aluminum foil;
“ammunition” means projectiles such as cartridges, bullets and shot shells, together with their fuses and primers, that can be fired from guns or otherwise propelled;
“apartment building” means a residential building of more than two storeys in height containing six (6) or more principal dwelling units;
“approved container” means containers described in Schedule “H”;
‘asbestos waste’ means solid or liquid waste that results from the removal of asbestos containing construction or insulation materials or the manufacture of asbestos containing products and contains in weight, more than 1% of asbestos fibres;
“aseptic containers” means any multi-layered beverage or soup box containers;
“ashes” means the residue from burnt materials;
"bi-weekly collection" means the collection of any material set out at curbside, one day every two weeks;
“black box” means a curbside recycling container as described in Section 4 of Schedule “H” and is used to collect recyclable materials described in Schedule “J”;
“blue box” means a curbside recycling container as described in Section 4 of Schedule “H” which is used to collect recyclable materials described in Schedule “I”;
“books” means all soft and hard covered books;
“boxboard” means non-corrugated cardboard packaging such as cereal and shoeboxes, and any similar rigid paper packaging with the metal or plastic portion or both removed;
“building owner” means the registered owner of multi-unit building / property, city facility and IC&I establishment or the building owner’s designate (i.e. property manager);
“bulky items” means large items including, but not limited to, bicycles, floor lamps, mattresses, furniture, microwaves, sinks, dismantled toilets, barrels, pool pumps, pool covers and any other discarded materials, which items would normally accumulate at a residential dwelling or multi-unit building and can easily be lifted up and into a collection vehicle;
“cart collection” means the system of collection of recyclable material and organic material placed in approved containers as described in Schedule “H” at a collection location, which is at or near the curb;
“Christmas trees” means trees including but not limited to the pine, spruce, balsam or fir species, which are typically decorated for display during the Christmas season;
“City” means the municipal corporation of the City of Ottawa or the geographic area of the City of Ottawa, as the context requires;
“City facility” or “municipal facility” means any property leased or owned by the City;
“City designated City facility” or “City designated municipal facility” means a City or municipal facility where collection service is provided for at least one material stream by the City’s Solid Waste Service;
“City designated IC&I” means any IC&I property receiving collection service of at least one material stream by the City’s Solid Waste Service, including yellow bag participants, City designated municipal facilities and City designated schools;
“clean fill” means earth, soil or crushed rock fill (less than 100 mm) or waste of a similar nature that does not contain putrescible material or soluble/decomposable chemical substances;
“collection location” means the location designated in Part VI of this by-law where garbage, special consideration items, bulky items, recyclable materials, yard waste and organic materials are placed out for collection;
“common pad collection” means the system of collection of garbage, recyclable material, bulky items, yard waste and organic material placed in approved containers as described in Schedule “H” at a shared common area location;
“containerized collection” means the system of collection of garbage, recyclable material and organic material placed in approved containers as described in Schedule “H” by means of a front-end collection vehicle;
“contract” means the agreement covering the performance for the collection of processing work, including the supply of any and all work, labour, implements and materials that could reasonably be required properly and satisfactorily to complete the Work to be performed and also includes all Contract documents, the plans, specifications, contract bond, the Pre-qualification Document and any written supplementary agreements that may be made in order to ensure the Work is completed in accordance with the standards set out in the contract;
“contractor” means any person, partnership or corporation and the employees of any such person, partnership or corporation with whom the City has entered into a contract or agreement for the collection or processing of waste, including the In-House Group;
“Council” means the Council of the City of Ottawa;
“curbside collection” means the system of collection of garbage, recyclable material, bulky items, yard waste and organic material placed in approved containers as described in Schedule “H” at a collection location, which is at or near the curb;
“customer” means any entity receiving collection service for at least one waste stream under the City’s residential waste collection system;
“Deputy City Manager” means the Deputy City Manager of the City Operations Portfolio of the City or authorized designate;
“diversion” means to direct any material away from disposal by recycling, composting, or otherwise ensuring higher end use, other than disposal, of the maximum quantity of the material stream;
“disposal” means landfilling, incinerating, gassifying, or otherwise disposing of a material with no higher end-use of the material stream by-products other than energy recovery;
“Environmental Compliance Approval” means all certificates, permits and approvals required by the Province of Ontario and issued by the Ministry of the Environment, for the undertaking of activities, pursuant to Part II.1 of the Environmental Protection Act and its regulations, as amended.
“Environmental Protection Act” means the Environmental Protection Act, R.S.O. 1990, c.E.19, as amended;
“E-Waste Items” means electronic items as defined by Phase 1 of the Waste Electrical Electronics Equipment (WEEE) Program and include: laptop computers, desktop computers, and peripherals such as keyboards and mice, monitors, desktop printers, disk drives, printers, fax machines and televisions;
“explosives” means any material or item that causes a sudden, almost instantaneous, release of gas, heat, and pressure, accompanied by loud noise when subjected to a certain amount of shock, pressure, or temperature including, but not limited to, road flares, dynamite, fireworks, etc.
“farm waste” means any waste which is the normal by-product of farming operations within the City and excludes construction and demolition materials from any building or structure, compostable materials other than what may result from clearing land for farm operation purposes, recyclable material that can be placed in the curbside collection program and other material deemed unacceptable for disposal at a landfill site by the Ministry of Environment or under this By-law;
“fine paper” means computer paper and all white and coloured ledger, including writing pad paper, letterhead, reports, business forms, copy paper and scratch pads, flyers and envelopes;
“firearm” means a barrelled weapon from which any shot, bullet or other projectile can be discharged and that is capable of causing serious bodily injury or death to a person, and includes any frame or receiver of such a barrelled weapon, as well as anything that can be adapted for use as a firearm;
“front-end loading container” means a two, three, four, six or eight cubic yard container emptied by a front end loading fork lift truck and used for the storage and collection of either garbage or recyclable material;
“front-end loading compacting container” means a front-end loading container used to compact garbage;
“gable top cartons” means milk and juice cartons constructed of coated paper and opened by unfolding the top;
“garbage” means all materials set out for disposal save and except those materials defined by this by-law as bulky items, recyclable material, yard waste, white goods, Christmas trees, organic material and non-collectable waste;
“glass bottles and jars” means all glass food and beverage bottles and jars;
“green bin” means an organics container which is described in Schedule “H” which is used to collect organic material as described in Schedule “L”;
“hazardous waste” means any material, which is so designated or restricted within the meaning of any Federal or Provincial statute or regulation;
“high-rise multi-unit building” means an apartment building containing six (6) or more dwelling units each of which:
- has self-contained living, kitchen and sanitary facilities; and
- is owned or rented on not less than a monthly basis;
“household hazardous waste” means any household product, material, or item labelled as “hazardous”, “toxic”, “explosive”, “ignitable”, “corrosive”, “reactive” or “flammable”; “imported waste” means any waste transported into the City from outside of the City by any person;
“In-House Group” means employees’ employed by the City of Ottawa, undertaking the execution of the Work within the collection contract;
“IC&I” is the acronym for Industrial Commercial and Institutional;
“IC&I establishment” means a non-residential establishment and includes:
- an enterprise or activity involving warehousing, storage, industrial manufacturing, commercial processes or operations;
- an enterprise, activity or project involving construction, renovation or demolition;
- research or an experimental enterprise or activity;
- clinics that provide medical diagnosis or treatment;
- laboratories, hospitals or veterinarian or animal hospitals;
- any business establishment including retail stores, offices, restaurants and gas bars;
- any seasonal or temporary business establishment including chip wagons and vegetable stands, Christmas tree sales;
- malls, strip malls, plazas and markets;
- an enterprise, activity or project involving landscaping;
- hotel, motel, apartment hotel, hostel, or bed and breakfast establishment;
- rooming houses;
- campsites (excluding the permanent residence trailer parks);
- any residence with a centralized eating facility including but not limited to senior’s home, shelters, special needs housing, nursing homes, (excluding rooming houses);
- child care centres;
- educational institutions including but not limited to schools, colleges, and universities and museums;
- residences of all educational institutions including but not limited to universities, colleges and hospitals;
- places of worship,
- any government facility/property including Provincial Government, Federal Government and National Capital Commission facilities as well as Consulates and Embassies and municipal facilities; or
- any other establishment as designated by the Deputy City Manager;
“IC&I garbage” includes all garbage, which would normally accumulate at any IC&I establishment, enterprise or activity;
“kitchen container” means the container used to temporarily store organic material within a residential dwelling;
“low-rise multi-unit building” means a group of residential dwellings of six (6) units or more per property, usually attached by a common wall such as townhouses, garden homes, stacked town homes or other similar residential complexes which is owned or rented on not less than a monthly basis;
“magazines/catalogues” means all magazines and catalogues bound with glue or stapled along the spine;
“material stream” or “stream” means a collection of similarly grouped materials to be sent to the same destination facility, specifically garbage stream to disposal, recycling stream to the recycling facility, organics stream to the organics processing facility, leaf & yard waste to composting facility, bulky waste to disposal, special consideration items to disposal as well as any additional material designated by the City for separate collection and destined to a specific facility for proper treatment, recovery or disposal;
“metal food and beverage containers” means all steel and aluminium food and beverage cans and containers;
“multi-unit building” includes high-rise multi-unit buildings and low-rise multi-unit buildings;
“newspapers” means all newspapers including the inserts that are delivered therein;
“non-collectable waste” means any item designated by Council or the Deputy City Manager which is not permitted to be collected within the City’s waste collection system;
“Notice of Violation” means a written document which indicates to an owner and / or building owner that they are not in compliance with this by-law.
“Officer” means a person duly appointed by a by-law of the City to administer and enforce the provisions of this by-law;
“old corrugated cardboard” or “OCC” means any paper board product which is composed of a rippled, flute or wave-shaped paper insert with paper liners bonded to the outside of the product and which does not have contaminants;
“Ontario Electronic Stewardship” or “OES” is a not-for-profit organization formed by retail, information technology and consumer electronic companies to implement the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Program Plan under the Waste Diversion Act. The plan requires brand owners, first importers, franchisors, and assemblers to pay fees for electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) supplied to Ontario. Collected fees will be used by OES to operate the WEEE program;
“organic material” means those items described in Schedule “L” or as designated by the Deputy City Manager to be collected separately for the purpose of organics collection;
“owner” means any registered owner, occupant, resident, lessee, tenant or any person managing any property receiving service under the City’s residential collection service contracts, but does not include a building owner;
“paint can” means any empty and dry paint can that falls within the meaning of an “empty container” as defined in regulation 347, made under the Environmental Protection Act, as amended;
“paper cores” means the cardboard paper roll used for toilet paper or paper towels;
“pathological waste” means waste that is:
- any part of the human body, including tissues and bodily fluids, but excluding extracted teeth, hair, nail clippings and the like,
- any animal carcass or part of,
- non-anatomical waste infected with a communicable disease,
- medicines, drugs or syringes, and
- bandages, dressings or other infected materials;
“plastic film” refers to all plastic grocery, retail store, milk bags and pouches, frozen food, bulk food, breads, meat and cheese bags and wrap, over wrap from boxed products, stretch wrap, cereal wrap, snack food bags and the like;
“private property” means property, which is privately owned and is not the City’s property, or property of a local board, or property of the Crown in Right of Ontario, the Crown in Right of Canada or any emanations thereof;
“public property” means property, which is the City’s property, or property of a local board, or property of the Crown in Right of Ontario, the Crown in Right of Canada or any emanations thereof;
“recycling cart” or “organic cart” means a 240L or 360L plastic wheeled cart designed to store and collect recyclable materials or organic material;
“recyclable material” means those items described in Schedules “I” and “J” or as designated by the Deputy City Manager to be collected separately for the purpose of recycling;
“residential dwelling” means one (1) or more rooms connected together as a self contained, separate unit in the same structure and constituting an independent housekeeping unit for residential occupancy by persons with facilities for persons to sleep, cook and eat including its own sanitary facilities, but does not include a multi-unit building;
“residential garbage” includes all garbage which would normally accumulate at a residential dwelling or multi-unit building, but shall not include non- collectable waste;
“residential waste collection system” means the City’s municipal waste collection system for all material streams from residential and City designated IC&I establishments;
"rigid plastic food container” means any plastic container composed of plastic (#1 to #7) that holds its own shape when empty and is designed to contain residential consumer quantities of food or beverage items;
"rooming house" means a principal dwelling within the whole of a residential use building that contains at least four rooming units available to be occupied for compensation and which may also contain dwelling units and an administration office accessory to the operation of the house and includes a rooming house, converted;
“rooming unit” means a room, or a suite of rooms, that constitute a separate, independent residential occupancy, but which is not self-contained and which requires access to other parts of the principal dwelling or building intended to serve the residents, including shower or bath facilities, eating areas, kitchens or bedrooms;
“scavenge” means the unauthorized removal of garbage, recyclable material, yard waste and organic material that have either been placed out for collection or in the case of some containerized waste, the location where the container is stored and filled before being moved to the collection location;
“sharp items” includes windows, drinking glasses, dishes, ceramics, mirrors, light bulbs, sheet metal and other objects capable of cutting or puncturing but does not include sharps; “sharps” includes used and unused hypodermic needles, insulin pen tips, lancets and glass pipe stems;
“special consideration items” are non reusable material used to absorb a person’s urine and fecal material only. These include incontinence products including, but not limited to pads and diapers;
“special needs housing” means a residential complex that contains a centralized kitchen, shared sanitary facilities and common living areas for residents, like shelters, rehabilitation homes, housing for the physically or mentally challenged, group homes and half-way houses;
“special waste” means solid non-hazardous waste otherwise acceptable for disposal at the Trail Waste Facility but requires additional handling for proper disposal, e.g. asbestos;
“spiral-wound container” means a cardboard type canister with metal ends at both ends (used for juice concentrate cans or chip containers);
“Take It Back Product Stewardship Program” is a City waste diversion program, where local retailers accept or take back materials that they sell;
“Treasurer” means the person appointed as the City Treasurer within the meaning of the Municipal Act, or authorized designate;
“tub and lids” means plastic extrusion-moulded, wide-mouth food and hardware containers such as margarine, yogurt, sour cream, drywall compound, or hand cleaner containers;
“urban” means the more densely populated and contiguous developments of housing;
“waste” means anything discarded for City collection from any source;
“weapon” means anything used, designed to be used for use in causing death or serious injury to any person, or for the purpose of threatening or intimidating any person;
“weekly collection” means the collection of a material stream one day every week;
“wet organic waste” means liquid waste or material that has attained a fluid consistency and has not been drained (examples: sour milk, cooking oil);
“white goods” includes refrigerators, freezers, stoves, dishwashers, dryers, washers, air conditioners, hot water tanks, oil tanks and furnaces;
“yard waste material” means those items described in Schedule “K” or as designated by the Deputy City Manager to be collected separately for the purpose of yard waste collection;
“Yellow Bag Program” is a curbside collection program for small eligible IC&I establishments that use specific yellow garbage bags approved by the Deputy City Manager.
Section 2 - Interpretation
- This by-law includes Schedules “A”, “B”, “C”, “D”, “E”, “F”, “G”, “H”, “I”, “J”, “K”, and “L” and these Schedules are hereby declared to form part of this by-law.
- All legislation and regulations referenced herein are Ontario provincial laws, as amended, unless noted otherwise.
- In this by-law, the word “metre” shall be represented by the abbreviation “m”, the word “kilogram” shall be represented by the abbreviation “kg”, the word “litre” shall be represented by the abbreviation “L”, the word “centimetre” shall be represented by the abbreviation “cm”, the words “cubic metre” shall be represented by the abbreviation “m³”.
- In this by-law, a word interpreted in the singular number has a corresponding meaning when used in the plural.
- The headings inserted in the by-law are for convenience of reference only and shall not affect the construction or interpretation of this by-law.
- The provisions of the by-law are severable. If any provision, Section or word is held to be invalid or illegal, such invalidity or illegality shall not affect or impair any of the remaining provisions, Sections or words.