The City offers several drop-off locations all over the city, but they are only meant for one type of material – such as community recycling depots for blue cart recyclables or household hazardous waste drop-offs for chemicals. The Eco Centres provide one centralized location to drop off many different types of materials in one visit. 

Yes. All vehicles must visit the scalehouse before entering the Eco Centre. Your vehicle is weighed in and out to keep track of the amount of materials being dropped off. 

You can use any residential vehicle to visit the Eco Centre. The area is paved making it an accessible, year-round option to use regardless of your vehicle type.

Some materials are part of larger environmental stewardship programs where consumers pay environmental fees at point-of-purchase. Those levies help with the disposal of the materials. For example, you may have noticed environmental fees on your receipt when buying items like paint or a television. 

Advise the scalehouse operator of your different materials. You can ask for the option to weigh in and out for each material so you can pay each rate separately. Please note that you will not be able to bypass the queue if there is a lineup.

If you choose to only weigh in once, then you will be charged the highest rate for all materials dropped off.

Composition of waste loads is highly variable. City staff have final say about acceptability of any material and the charges applied to each load.

All materials that do not go in the garbage bins will be reused or recycled. Here are a few examples:

• Yard waste – composted directly at City sites to become nutrient-rich compost
• Drywall – recycled back into new drywall
• Bikes - fixed and repurposed by various Calgary non-profits
• Foam packaging – processed and turned back into new hard plastic products like picture frames
• Paint - sorted, filtered, and reused as new paint
• Tires - recycled and turned into new products like playground flooring
• Clean wood - chipped and re-used as mulch for City operations
• Scrap metal and large metal appliances - recycled and turn back into new metal products.
• Clothing and shoes – recycled or resold in non-profit stores
• Reusable household items – resold in non-profit stores to support community and social programs (available seasonally in summer months)

Yes, businesses may get directed to the Eco Centre to drop off their materials instead of the landfill. All applicable commercial rates will still apply.