Mounds of colourful plastic, paper and glass tower six metres high and cover most surfaces at Sherbrooke’s recycling plant.
Several stray cats climb to the top of the pile, playing in cardboard boxes and sniffing empty tin cans.
Every step produces a loud crunch as miscellaneous discarded objects shatter underfoot.
Conveyor belts used to sort the material are buried under the mess.
Pierre Savard is the vice-president of the regional sorting facility Recup-Estrie, which reopened four days ago after being shut down for two weeks.
He blames the chaos on Ricova — the multinational waste management company hired to run the plant, claiming it did not fulfill the terms of its contract.
“We’d sent warnings and complaints to Ricova for several months and nothing changed,”
This story was originally published on CBC News. To read the rest of this news worthy story, please visit http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/recycling-crisis-1.4708586?cmp=rss.