Alberta’s EPR Transition Webinar Series – Examining the role of oversight bodies and producer responsibility organizations

Ed Gugenheimer joined the Alberta Recycling Management Authority (ARMA) in 2019 as our Chief Executive Officer, bringing over 27 years of experience in executive leadership, fiscal governance, and operational expertise.
 
Since joining, Ed has been instrumental in leading ARMA’s strategic success, including bringing life to our vision of Inspiring a Future Without Waste, adopted in 2020. His innate talent for strategic execution, financial, operational, and risk management, and his passion for building healthy organizational cultures have allowed ARMA to reach new heights in the sustainability and recycling sector. This includes addressing red tape reduction and launching our 43M electronics pilot program during the pandemic, helping better position ARMA to support our communities in recycling initiatives and diverting unnecessary waste from landfills. Ed also helped deliver a new strategic plan for the organization, and a new corporate governance model, vision, and mission that are helping shape the future of ARMA.
 
Most recently, under Ed’s leadership, ARMA has been selected by the Government of Alberta as the province’s extended producer responsibility (EPR) oversight body. Securing this position was a serious undertaking, but with Ed’s leadership and commitment to creating a more sustainable, innovative future, the organization is ready to help move Alberta forward. As the oversight body, Ed and his team will be responsible for working closely with stakeholders to deliver an extended producer responsibility program for Alberta, an approach where the physical and financial burden of collecting, sorting, processing, and recycling waste shifts to the producer and away from local governments and taxpayers. As ARMA moves into its 31st year of inspiring Albertans to reduce waste, Ed and his team are focused on shaping a strong, circular economy that sets Alberta up for continued success on the global stage. 
 
Ed is a chartered professional accountant, bringing a strong background of financial acumen to his leadership role. He has held numerous positions across diverse industries supporting organizations. He resides in Edmonton with his wife, Leanne, and son, Addison. Beyond his professional life, Ed enjoys spending time at the lake and pursuing leadership, stewardship, and community development goals through his volunteer work.

As CEO, Allen Langdon is responsible for leading Circular Materials through the development of Ontario’s new blue box recycling system while expanding the organization’s operations into other provinces, starting with New Brunswick. His mission is to support producers with a robust not-for-profit service offering that advances the circular economy, delivers national harmonization of extended producer responsibility (EPR) services and harnesses competitive procurement to provide the best value for producers.

Prior to joining Circular Materials, Allen served as the President and CEO of Return-It, British Columbia’s very successful used beverage container management program in Canada. In this role, Allen oversaw the modernization of Return-It’s collection network, which consists of more than 170 collection sites, including Return-It depots, Express Plus and Express & GO stations. Return-It has routinely exceeded a 75% recovery rate for used beverage containers in British Columbia, and its network has supported the collection of new materials, including waste electrical and electronic equipment.

Allen also served as the Managing Director for Recycle BC, the first 100% EPR program for paper and packaging in North America where industry assumed full financial and managerial responsibility for the residential recycling system.

Allen currently serves as an Advisory Board Member for the Washington State Recycling Development Centre.

Mannie Cheung is the Vice President of Operations at Product Care Association of Canada, a not-for-profit industry association that develops, implements, and operates extended producer responsibility programs for household hazardous and special products in Canada and the USA on behalf of its’ industry members. Mannie has over 20 years of leadership and management experience in the extended producer responsibility sector and more than 9 years in the hazardous waste management industry; leading business/program development, strategic development, compliance, and optimization of program efficiencies and effectiveness. 

Jason Brown is the Director of Program and Project Management at Call2Recycle. Founded in 1997, the not-for-profit organization works on behalf of stakeholders to provide its battery recycling program, at no-cost to consumers across Canada. Over 90 percent of people in Canada reside within a 15-kilometer radius of a Call2Recycle drop-off site – making battery recycling convenient and easy. Since inception, Call2Recycle has recycled over 40 million kilograms of batteries, keeping them out of local landfills and recovering the valuable materials that can be used to create new batteries and other products.

At Call2Recycle, Jason oversees multiple provincially mandated consumer battery stewardship programs. He works closely with a wide range of stakeholders, including program industry members, government institutions, advisory committees, service providers, and the public. He has a wealth of experience in the extended producer responsibility field, having managed numerous stewardship programs over the past six years, in both Canada and the United States.