If you pay attention to what you dispose of around campus, you may have noticed a three-bin system instituted about a year ago. You might have been careful about sorting your waste into its different categories, and acted the part of an excellent citizen. But according to Paly Green Team senior co-president Gracie Cain, you probably haven’t.
The Green Team is in its fourth year at Paly, and the compost-recycling-garbage disposal system is one of its major projects, according to Cain.
“So far the three bin system hasn’t been very successful,” Cain said. “We think this is mainly due to the lack of education around campus and the fact that we do not have a uniform system throughout school.”
Zea Luce, the outreach coordinator for GreenWaste of Palo Alto, gave a larger and slightly more hopeful viewpoint.
“[It] is definitely still a work in progress,” Luce said. “Some schools, just like some people, are very conscious and have taken it to the next level, hardly producing any garbage. Others could use a lot of work and additional education…This is a long-term project; we are teaching the kindergarteners and hopefully they will take their recycling and compost knowledge with them as they move through the grades. In any event, all schools have reduced their garbage to some extent, which is great!”
However, Cain and the club have plans to increase awareness, which they hope will have a corollary effect on success.
“We are working on both of these problems through educational videos on INfocus and posters which will be released on our Going Green day coming up this April,” Cain said.
One huge problem with implementing green projects and planning green events is misinformation. At the Paly Green Team presentation to the PTSA in February, several members asked Luce about basic information for elementary parts of going green, like what items are recyclable, compostable and destined for the landfill. A revelation that throwing away food in the garbage is more environmentally friendly than using water and a garbage disposal was one among many that day.
“There is a lot of misinformation out there and recycling rules have changed over the years, with different cities accepting different materials, and more recently cities have added the third confusion of compost,” Luce said. “The hope is that with a bit of education and practice, it all becomes second nature and no one will ever dream of throwing their banana peel in the garbage in the future.”
The idea of an online guide for “greening your event” was suggested at the PTSA meeting with great enthusiasm at the meeting, but plans to create it are on hold for now.
“Right now we are really trying to focus on providing the school with a sustainable and uniform recycling system,” Cain said. “The green events guide has not been a top priority but we hope to provide the Paly community with one soon!”
Greenwaste, in conjunction with Green Team, has also piloted a three bin system at Town and Country in an effort to make Paly as green as possible.
“Town and Country has been very proactive in starting to compost, do more recycling, and greatly reduce the garbage generated by the businesses located there,” Luce said. “Most of this is behind the scenes, but they are trying some new containers for public use on their campus – look for the cans with blue and green lids.”
The company is also planning a composting system for all Palo Alto residents in the future. There is currently a debate as to the status of the landfill concerning these plans, which can be found here.
Both Luce and Cain said that as far as action Paly students can take to support the effort, simply taking the time to sort and place their garbage in the right place using the system would be a great start for now, and both would love to see improvements on this front.
More information can be found on the GreenWast website, and any questions about proper disposal or the current and future projects can be directed to Zea Luce at [email protected].