City of Iqaluit recycling proposal sitting in limbo with Department of Finance

ENVIRONMENT  SEP 2, 2026 – 12:36 PM EDT City of Iqaluit recycling proposal sitting in limbo with Department of Finance No plans to reintroduce program ‘at this time,’ says territorial government spokesperson Derek Allerton picks up cans from the street in November 2025. The Iqaluit resident has been collecting cans ever since Northern Collectibles closed its recycling service last July. He says since then he’s picked up approximately 14,000 cans. (File photo by Jeff Pelletier) By Miriam Lafontaine Work to re-establish a beverage recycling program in Iqaluit seems to have stalled with the Nunavut government, after the city presented territorial officials with a feasibility study earlier this year. Iqaluit residents lost the program in July 2025 after local business Northern Collectables discontinued the service. Iqaluit city council passed a motion in December, asking administration to embark on a feasibility study for the municipality to take over the program. The study analyzed adding a reverse vending machine and other container deposit options for the city, along with cost estimates. The city then met with territorial officials, said city spokesperson Geoffrey Byrne, but can’t move forward without financial support. “Council has been clear that any such program would need to be cost-neutral to the municipality,” he said in an email. Nunatsiaq News asked the Finance Department what came of these talks but only received a statement from spokesperson Hala Duale that the department “does not have plans to reintroduce a refundable container deposit program at this time.” Derek Allerton, an Iqaluit resident who says he collected approximately 14,000 cans off the streets in the past year, said the Government of Nunavut’s response is frustrating. “Tens of thousands of alcohol aluminum beverage cans litter the streets of Iqaluit, and millions of aluminum cans are going to landfill,” he said. Some of these cans have made it to a fundraising bin managed by Aqsarniit middle school’s environmental club, which started a beverage drop off this spring with help from the Department of Environment. But the club only accepts non-alcoholic beverage containers. “In my personal experience, one in four cans littering the city are pop cans, and the rest are alcohol beverage cans,” Allerton said, adding the most popular brands he sees littering the streets are Molson Dry, Budweiser and Molson Canadian.  The environmental club’s initiative is far from a…