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Recycling Bulletin

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Recycling Bulletin # 14
- news from a national leader in campus recycling October 19, 2001

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In this Bulletin:

1. CU Recycling: Grants Boost Recycling at CU
2. Local Recycling Info: New County Recycling Facility Up and Running
3. Industry News: Staten Island Landfill Receives WTC Rubble
4. Frightening Fact: Trash from Space
5. Glimmer of Hope: Recycling a Success
6. Get Involved / Upcoming Events: Green Teams, Recycling Presentations

1. *************** CU Recycling ***************

RECENT GRANTS BOOST RECYCLING AT CU A report from Jack DeBell, Director A major recycling expansion is underway on campus with new capital funding and research projects in the works. CU’s Student Union and President’s Office, Boulder County, the Governor’s Office, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have committed their support recently to maximize CU recycling’s impact. On campus, a new cardboard recycling system is already collecting eight cubic yards per week from each campus dining hall. It was pressed into service during residence hall move-in last month and compacted over seven tons of cardboard boxes and delivered the material to the new county recycling facility. Boulder County augmented Student Government funding with a $10,000 grant for the new truck and collection bins. Collection and disposal costs to the University have decreased as a result. Another capital improvement plans to divert food waste from campus dining facilities. The Governor’s Office of Energy Management and Conservation recently funded CU Recycling to share its research results with the state. Student researchers have begun compiling the technical information for institutions like universities, hospitals, and correctional facilities to convert food waste to a value-added fertilizer. A state-wide composting summit will be held on campus in January to discuss CU’s findings and recommendations. The emerging problem of electronic waste will also be tackled this year by CU student researchers. The EPA has funded CU to recommend reuse and recycling options for computers and electronics. Regulations will soon require businesses and institutions to change their disposal methods for this toxic part of the waste stream. CU’s President’s Office, the State Office of Economic Development, and the Corporation for National Service are assisting the project.

2. *************** Local Recycling Info *******************

Boulder County’s new county-wide recycling processing center began operating in July, and opened to the public at a Grand Opening Celebration last month The facility, funded by County recycling tax revenues, is located on 63rd Street, just north of Arapahoe Avenue in Boulder. The facility includes a 24-hour public drop-off center for glass, plastic, aluminum, newspaper, cardboard, paperboard, opened and sorted junk mail, phonebooks, magazines and catalogs, and milk and juice cartons. The previous City of Boulder recycling drop-off center on Pearl East Parkway will continue to operate through the month of October. Beginning November 1, the public should use the new drop-off center on 63rd Street. Stay tuned for exiting changes to Boulder’s curbside recycling program, coming in November.

3. *************** Industry News *****************

Excerpted from an article by Mark Schoofs in the 9/28/01 Wall Street Journal: The 3,000-acre Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island in New York City is the world’s largest landfill. At its peak, it took in 29,000 tons of trash a day. It was finally closed six months ago. Now it has been reopened, on an emergency basis, to receive the estimated 1.25 million tons of debris from the World Trade Center disaster. New Yorkers have sent trash to Fresh Kills since 1948. Its name - always a little eerie, and especially so now - has nothing to do with death or garbage. "Kil" is an old Dutch word for waterway; Fresh Kills was once a beautiful marshland. This landfill may be the best archeological record of postwar America, containing everything from LPs to DVDs, typewriters to laptops, and newspapers that can still be read, even after 40 years. William Rathje, a research professor at the Stanford Archeology Center at Stanford University in California, has excavated parts of the landfill, boring 24 wells down as far as 100 feet into the garbage. Computers didn’t usher in a paperless society, he found. To the contrary, the amount of paper deposited in the landfill in the 1980s was 10 percent higher than in the 1970s, he found. Now, the landfill will almost certainly house the World Trade Center. No final decision has been made as to the final resting place of the towers, but the expense of moving the debris a second time would be huge. If the ruins stay there, it will only add to the mystique of a place already enveloped in legend. Some people speculate that union leader Jimmy Hoffa, whose body was never found, is buried at Fresh Kills. A deceased elephant once ended up there. There are some parts of the World Trade Center rubble that won’t be landfilled. The heavy structural girders are sent directly to two recycling companies in New Jersey, and some of the metal that’s going to the landfill now, such as car bodies found in the rubble, will probably eventually be sent to scrap yards for recycling. Part of the jagged exoskeleton of the building is being preserved for a possible future monument.

4. *************** Frightening Fact *****************

The often-repeated story - that Staten Island, NY’s Fresh Kills landfill is so big it can be seen from space with the naked eye - is true.

5. *************** Glimmer of Hope ****************

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, recycling is one of the best environmental success stories of the late 20th century. Recycling, including composting, diverted 64 million tons of material away from landfills and incinerators in 1999, up from 34 million tons in 1990. Today, the US recycles 28 percent of its waste, a rate that has almost doubled during the past 15 years. The EPA has more information about recycling on their website at http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/muncpl/recycle.htm

6. *************** Get Involved / Upcoming Events***************

JOIN THE GREEN TEAMS! VOLUNTEER DAY NOV. 10

Saturday, November 10, teams of volunteers will distribute new City of Boulder recycling information in student neighborhoods - your help is needed! The Green Teams are students who share recycling and other environmental information with off-campus students who live on heavily student-populated neighborhoods, particularly the Hill and Goss/Grove neighborhoods. These educational efforts will be especially important this fall when the city of Boulder’s curbside program undergoes major changes. We need your help to distribute information on what, where and how to properly recycle. The Green Teams also meet weekly, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 4 pm in the Environmental Center, University Memorial Center room 331, and spend 2 hours spreading the recycling word. Contact Zoe at 303-492-8307 or email cure@stripe.colorado.edu to participate on November 10 or anytime, or for more information.

CAMPUS RECYCLING PRESENTATIONS

Invite CU Recycling to your next staff/faculty meeting or residence hall meeting! This presentation can answer your questions about recycling, campus services, recycled products, how to reduce waste in your campus environment and more. The program includes: slide show of the campus program, hands-on question and answer period, posters and materials, a recycling survey, free coffee mugs and recycling stickers, 10 - 45 minutes of great information. Call CU Recycling at 303-492-8307 or email cure@stripe.colorado.edu to schedule a presentation. NOVEMBER 15 IS AMERICA RECYCLES DAY! Watch for a special recycling e-mail bulletin with local events and information.

Subscribe to the CU Recycling Bulletin

The Recycling Bulletin is circulated via a closed list;  only CU Recycling has access to the rest of the subscriber list.  Subscribers' names and e-mail addresses are not available to any other group or used for any other purpose.

About University of Colorado at Boulder Recycling

The University of Colorado's recycling program is a non-profit, campus-based organization whose mission is to instill awareness of the benefits of waste reduction and recycling.  CU Recycling is widely regarded as one of the nation's leading campus programs. Awards have been given by such groups as the EPA, National Recycling Coalition, and the Office of Federal Environmental Executive, who in 2000, announced CU Recycling the model campus program in the United States.

The university community is encouraged to get involved in CU Recycling's many activities.  For more information, call (303)492-8307 or visit http://www.colorado.edu/recycle

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