Reducing Trips To The Landfill
Reducing waste saves money today and in the future
Situation:
SevenGen developed a Business Waste Reduction Plan for a company that was looking for ways to reduce the economic and environmental impact of hauling their waste to a landfill. The plan that SevenGen designed was comprised of a high-level Environmental Impact assessment, a full Business Waste Characterization Report, and a Community Based Social Marketing Summary of Recommendations for waste reduction methods.
Implementation:
Environmental Impact:
As a first step, SevenGen performed a high level environmental impact assessment prior to doing more detailed waste analysis. The environmental impact assessment provided SevenGen's client with a comprehensive view of all the major inputs and outputs of their business processes.
Business Waste Characterization Report:
SevenGen then took a 59 lb. sample from the dumpster at the client's site. Landfill bound waste was then sorted into nine categories at the company's headquarters. These categories were then weighed and cataloged.
Report Results:
Numeric weight information and observations from this sort suggest:
Potentially recyclable materials, in the form of containers, represented 42% of the garbage stream by weight. Sorted categories included: glass bottles and jars, aluminum cans, plastic bottles, and plastic bags/films. Additional plastics, especially industrial piping, could be recycled or even re-used
General house trash (other non-recyclables) was the second largest category, making up 40% by weight. Most of the trash was lightweight plastic that did not fall into the plastic categories sorted and dirty food and beverage containers that were not recyclable.
The lightweight plastic seems to be from plastics - gloves used by worksite labor, plastic wrapping and caution tape.
The food and beverage containers were from various fast food restaurants, mostly coffee cups and to-go containers brought in by employees
Potentially recyclable materials, in the form of paper, represented 16% by weight. The paper appeared to be from jobsites, including aggregate bags and non-corrugated cardboard (miscellaneous small boxes).
Overall most recyclables are not in the landfill-bound dumpster. However there are still a few recyclables; such as cardboard, paper, recyclable glass, cans and plastic; that are mistakenly being sent to the landfill.
Community Based Social Marketing Summary of Recommendations:
The following list of categories were used by SevenGen to make numerous client-specific recommendations:
- Vivid Communications
- Incentives
- Norms
- Prompts
- Commitments
Project Results:
Several recommendations were immediately adopted, including moving recycling bins to more accessible locations (Norms) and creating recycling signage (Vivid Communications). Successful long-term waste reduction requires the client's commitment to plan's recommendations. Ongoing employee education is helping the client reduce the amount of waste produced by its business processes.