Article by Jennifer Smith. Photos at the end.
Sitting on a lounge chair, pina colada in hand, one rarely looks out at the calm, crystal-clear waters of the Caribbean and thinks about garbage. But maybe we should.
The owners of Puntacana Resort and Club sure have. They are just completing the finishing touches on their new Centro de Reciclaje y Incineracion (CRI), a US$2 million dollar plant that will burn trash and salvage organic waste and other recyclable materials for reuse.
The plant, borne in part as way to meet U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) guidelines on waste disposal, was conceptualized and spearheaded by Jake Kheel, the director of the Puntacana Ecological Foundation.
“We could have bought the cheapest incinerator, and gone the cheapest, easiest route,” Kheel said recently. “But that’s not how Puntacana operates.”
Grupo PUNTACANA, the umbrella organization that owns the Punta Cana International Airport, Puntacana Resort and Club, a marina and a number of real estate developments on its 15,000-acre property, helped form the not-for-profit foundation in 1988. Kheel, a grandnephew of one of Puntacana’s original developers, has a Masters degree in environmental management from Cornell University and became the environmental director for Grupo Puntacana and director of the ecological foundation in March 2005.
Instead of a challenge, Kheel saw the disposing of the 4-odd tons of waste that comes out of the airport each day as an opportunity to further integrate socially responsible environmental management with sound business practices.
“The goal is to show a positive example,” Kheel said. “Something that doesn’t damage the environment, and that you can make money out of.”
His options for disposing of waste locally were limited, especially when a primary goal for the organization is to protect the natural beauty and health of the local ecosystem.
“The reality is the landscape in the area is limestone and coral,” Kheel explained. “So all the contaminants that drain through the coral and get into your water, then flow into the ocean. Our aim is to protect the environment. We could pay someone to haul it to the caliche mines or dump it illegally. But our aim is to set up a model in the region and show the country it can work. It is working.”
To accomplish this, the foundation hired Costa Rican engineer Victor Ojeda, a specialist in building incineration and recycling plants throughout the Americas. As a result, the plant has two state-of-the-art incineration units that meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standards and a storage facility that aids in the separation and classification of waste. They are budgeted to buy a conveyor belt and high-volume trash compact to further enhance the efficiency of the plant.
Is the plant unique in the country? Recently, representatives from the Organization of Internacional Regional de Sanidad Agropecuaria (OIRSA), the organization tasked with waste disposal oversight at government-operated airports, toured the plant. “They were blown away,” Kheel said. “They said they’d not seen anything like this anywhere.”
Now that they have been successful meeting the FAA waste disposal regulations, Kheel said the aim is to further integrate the benefits of the plant into Grupo Puntacana’s three core businesses and create “a closed circuit” within the resort. This requires separating the burnable trash from the organic waste so that it can be composted, and, separating glass, paper and aluminum for recycling. Ultimately Puntacana hopes to use its leverage as a major customer in the area to convince companies such as the Presidente brewing company to come and get the bottles and recycle them for future use.
“The goal is zero discharge,” Kheel said. “By separating all the garbage, they (at the plant) are creating streams of usefulness.”
And it is very much in Grupo Puntacana’s interest to do so. In addition to the airport, the resort has waste from its hotels, restaurants and golf courses. It also provides landscaping and trash pick up for its residential and vacation homes. At incineration costs of $200 per metric ton, they have a keen financial incentive to seek out efficient ways to deal with their trash.
Kheel said their aim is to implement what is known as the Toronto model, a program where the municipal government provides green bins to residents and asks them to separate out their organic waste from all other forms of trash. As other forms of waste are easy to separate out, the green bin only request reduces the burden on residents and enables small communities to compost the organic waste on a massive scale. Through anaerobic digestion, a process where organic waste is converted to rich fertilizer and methane gas, a community can create two valuable commodities: rich, fertile soil and energy.
While there is increasing demand for nutrient rich soil and energy, Kheel said the hope of this project is to enhance the efficiency of operations at Puntacana and provide an example to the region.
“It is not likely we’ll sell the compost,” Kheel said, noting he now faces the happy challenge of deciding how best to integrate the compost into an already eco-friendly operation at Puntacana. “But we are showing that it is a viable business,” he added. “There is huge money to be made in managing waste.”
Punta Cana Ecological Foundation
There are many reasons to go to Punta Cana for a relaxing stay or a challenging game of golf. But a bonus of visiting the Puntacana Resort and Spa is the ability to witness a massive attempt at sustainable tourism first hand.
The Puntacana Ecological Foundation was founded in 1988 through the financial endowment and administrative support of Grupo Puntacana, the initiators of tourism on the eastern shores of the Dominican Republic and the owners of the Puntacana Resort and Club, the Punta Cana International airport and the Punta Cana Marina.
As a mandate, the independent, not-for-profit foundation is dedicated to protecting and restoring the natural resources of the Punta Cana region and serving as a role model for sustainable development in the Dominican Republic.
Since its inception, the foundation has supported research in environmental sustainability and used the 23-odd-square miles of the Grupo Puntacana property as its testing ground for sustainable development and business practices.
Some of the foundation’s projects are more visual and tourist-friendly while others are more technical and behind the scenes.
Some of these projects are as follows:
• Water conservation: A water pumping station that geographically distributes the area’s relatively scarce water supply throughout the resort to minimize pressure on the local aquifer. The pumping system controls the amount of water used at the resort and insures that freshwater resources are managed properly.
• Water recycling: A water treatment facility that uses anaerobic digestion and settling ponds to filter out impurities. The treated water is then recycled to use for irrigation on the resorts ample green areas. Potable and treated water is monitored for quality at various points in the process to ensure that water is safe for human use and irrigation.
• Laundry: An industrial laundry facility on the property supports the resort as well as the neighboring hotels. To conserve energy, steam heat is captured from an adjacent electrical power plant and then used to power the industrial-strength clothes dryers. The water used at the laundry is either recycled back into the plant’s operations or treated at the water treatment plant and recycled for irrigation.
• Nature Reserve: The foundation oversees 1,500 acres of land, donated by Grupo Puntacana, for use in recreation, conservation and study. It has natural lagoons, walking trails, and provides a forest habitat for birds, insects, turtles and other wildlife.
• Worm farm: Last January, the foundation worked with Dominican Rafael Tavares to set up large-scale vermicomposting on its property, one of the first hotels on the island to do so. Vermicomposting (also know as lombricomposting) is the process of breaking down organic matter using a specific type of earthworm. The worms' digestive system, along with bacteria inside the digestive tract, accelerates decomposition and stabilization of the organic matter and transforms it into nutrient rich soil and fertilizer free of toxins.
In the first stage of the project, the foundation expects to convert between 200 to 500 pounds of organic waste per month. The process, also known as anaerobic digestion, is fast and efficient. One pound of worms can digest up to a half pound of organic material per day.
• Organic gardening: Organic gardens, using composted soil, now provide the Puntacana Resort and local residents with organic produce.
• Golf course conservation: Puntacana Resort pays the University of Georgia a license to use its patented SeaIsle Supreme Paspalum grass for two of its golf courses. The grass is planted on the property’s 40-acre sod farm and it can thrive on sea or recycled water. It needs little or no topsoil to grow and is often grown on sand.
The foundation focuses its attention in two other equally important areas.
The Puntacana Center for Sustainability was established in 1999 as a research and education facility devoted to creating solutions for the sustainable development of the Caribbean. The center was originally formed between the Puntacana Ecological Foundation, Grupo Puntacana and Cornell University, but has since been expanded to include a diverse coalition of national and international institutions. At any given time, a cadre of students and scientists are on the premises, conducting research, seeking out ways to quell or reverse environmental degradation, and promoting environmental education and leadership locally and internationally.
In 2004, the foundation also launched the Coastal Marine Project for the region. Punta Cana rests along side one of the largest barrier reefs in the Dominican Republic. An important breeding ground for pelagic and reef fish, it is presently in critical condition due to large scale, un-checked development by a growing list of hotel chains along Punta Cana coastline. The project attempts to balance the continued growth and development of the region, the long-term health and sustainability of the coastal zone and the needs of local fishermen and users.
The Marine project is working with national and international partners in the following areas of action:
• Water quality monitoring (residual, potable, and coastal waters
• Implementation of national norms and regulations
• Environmental permits and certifications
• Coral reef monitoring and restoration
• Beach stabilization and nourishment
• Legal status and policy implementation
• Long-term research and monitoring
• Golf course environmental oversight
• Design and construction
• Water quality and use management
• Nutrient management
During a recent interview on the benefits of building a US$2 million incineration and recycling plant on Puntacana property, Jake Kheel, the foundation’s director and Grupo Puntacana’s director of environment, was quick to stress to dual benefits of incorporating sustainability into business practices, particularly in a region whose economic success relies solely on maintaining its natural environment.
“This (plant) is 100% led by the private sector in a country where there is no regulation,” Kheel stressed. “But the company is doing it for itself because it is our corporate responsibility and because it makes good sense. It is responsible tourism.”
Outside of the plant
Inside of the plant
Incinerator
Responsible tourism at Puntacana Resort
