Wednesday, February 20, 2013 // Issue 79, Volume 78
THE DAILY COUGAR
T H E
O F F I C I A L
S T U D E N T
N E W S PA P E R
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U N I V E R S I T Y
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For health sophomore Samira Mortazavi, recycling is the only option. “If it’s a bottle, I recycle it,” she said. The new bins’ purpose is to inspire more students to do the same. | Mary Dahdouh/The Daily Cougar
CAMPUS
UH bellies up to brand-new bins Program plans to update recycling process Channler K. Hill Assistant news editor
The 2013 Solid Waste Plan brings UH the new BigBelly program, providing compacting containers that will be seen across campus throughout the year. The containers will be a more efficient resource for the inner core of campus and will be placed along sidewalks and outside of buildings. The units are solar powered with a side for trash and recyclables. “The trash container itself replaces six to eight of the trash containers around it because of the compactor,” said Manager of Central Facilities Service Area 2 James Ballowe. “We’re on campus every day picking those up. With the solar
power unit, it automatically sends information back telling us when it’s full. They’re (operated by) Wi-Fi and the recycling portion is the same. We’re able to pull the recycling and trash containers away from the areas of the BigBellies. It’s our plan to have 90 of these units out on campus by the summer.” With 250 recycling bins on campus and 322 small blue bins in campus buildings, the BigBelly containers will replace some of the older recycle and trash cans. The recycling portion is single-stream, where students or faculty can throw in plastic, aluminum cans, paper, cardboard and other recyclables eliminating the need for multiple recycling bins. All on campus housing facilities also have recycling bins. Cougar Village has bins on each floor. The University works with a company called Greenstar
Recycling, after switching from Evergreen Recycling, to save an operating cost. Evergreen would pick up the plastic, aluminum and cardboard, but it was up to Central Facilities to sort the materials. “We ran three different trucks. Now we run one truck. It’s saving personnel cost and operational fuel,” Ballowe said. “With Green Star they allow us to take the material to them and they do all the sorting.” Program Coordinator for Sustainability for University Services Leah Wolfthal said recycling is important to minimize the unwanted ecological effects of waste. She said her understanding is that reduction and reuse are often the desired first steps in terms of ecological impacts. In Fiscal Year 2012 the University generated a total of 546.9 tons of recyclable material and 2,738 tons
of trash. Ballowe said he believes that 70 percent of the trash being thrown out is recyclable. “Our diversion rate has been 25 percent this year. That’s the amount
of what we took out of the trash to recycle. Our goal is to get to 40 percent by 2020,” Ballowe said. BELLY continues on page 3
The Big Belly bins, which can already be seen some places on campus, will replace some of the old trash and recycling containers. These units will be included in the 250 total containers. | Mary Dahdouh/The Daily Cougar