RMC Waste Reduction Group

1
RMC Waste Reduction Group

• ENST 302 Spring 2006
• Elliott DeRemer
• Meredith Gray
• Melody Yenn
• Claire Sudolski

2
Goal and Focus of Group

• Our group focused on recycling, waste reduction,
  and sustainability awareness issues involving
  Willys Pub
• We attempted to change things by putting more
  recycling bins in pub and instituting an
  educational ad campaign to encourage recycling

3
Glass Recycling Information

• In addition to preventing the creation of extra
  waste for every new container made, recycling
  also helps avoid many of the costs of material
  extraction, manufacture, and waste disposal.
• Glass, because its structure does not deteriorate
  with multiple uses, can be recycled indefinitely.
• For every metric tonne of glass that we recycle,
  we preserve an additional 1.2 metric tonnes of
  virgin raw material from extraction for the
  creation of new glass. This includes 1,300
  pounds of sand, 433 pounds of soda ash, 433
  pounds of limestone, and 151 pounds of feldspar.

4
Benefits of Recycling

• In the UK, the glass industry uses 8,611,000,000
  kilowatt hours annually in producing glass, and
  the fossil fuels used in the factory furnaces
  produce 1.8 million metric tonnes of carbon
  dioxide. By recycling glass, the energy required
  by the furnaces is reduced, and approximately 700
  fewer pounds of carbon dioxide are produced per
  ton of glass melted.
• A relative 10 increase in recycled crushed glass
  (cullet) reduces particulates by 8, sulfur
  oxides by 10, and nitrogen oxides by 4.

5
An Alternative Refillable Bottles

• Refillable bottles used to be the norm.
• Refillable bottles weigh 10.5 ounces, as opposed
  to one-way bottles, at 5.9 ounces.
• Each bottle can be used 20-50 times before it is
  worn out and recycled.
• Using one refillable bottle 25 times, rather than
  25 one-way bottles, saves 93 more glass,
  consumes 93 less energy, and requires the
  handling of 96 fewer bottles as solid waste.

6
Houstons Recycling Efforts

• Houston recycles 5 of its municipal waste
  stream. Compare this to Austin, which recycles
  28.5.
• The typical American creates almost 1600 pounds
  of trash each year. If Houston, including Rice,
  was recycling as much as Austin, this would
  divert 376 pounds of waste per person, per year.
  In our city, with a population of roughly two
  million people, this is a total of 752 million
  pounds of waste avoided per year.
• Per Capita daily trash production in
  Houston/Galveston area is 7.09 pounds, compared
  to the national average of 4.3 pounds.
• At this rate, the areas 21 landfills will be
  full by the year 2013

7
Rices Recycling Efforts

• This year, Rice participated in Recyclemania and
  finished in the upper half of the standings out
  of 87 universities.
• There is still a lack of awareness among the
  student population, and a general feeling of
  apathy when it comes to recycling. Student
  perception is that the custodial staff does not
  actually recycle.
• In the year 2005, Rice diverted 15.86, or 341
  tons, of its total waste stream for recycling.
• If Rice could make a reasonable improvement in
  its recycling up to 25, for instance we
  could divert an additional 197 tons of material
  per year, 3 tons of which would be glass.

8
Perceived Problems at RMC

• Recycling at pub is not visible or easily
  accessible
• Recycling areas in the upstairs of the RMC are
  not fully utilized, and are often hard to find
• Pub currently uses 6 plastic cups, which is not
  recyclable in Houston

9
Ad Campaign

• Our goal was to create more prominent and
  permanent signage to promote recycling and
  increase peoples awareness of recycling
  opportunities at the RMC
• We created two separate campaigns one for pub,
  and one for the upstairs
• We also replaced last years groups smaller
  signs with our larger ones, and included maps
  showing recycling locations at the RMC
• Pub Poster Samples

10
Poster Campaign for Upstairs RMC
Sustainability meeting the needs of the present
without compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their own needs. RECYCLING AT
RICE IT JUST MAKES SENSE
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Poster Problems

• We had not anticipated the amount of
  consideration involved in a permanent ad campaign
• Locations considered Grand Hall, Kelly Lounge,
  Info Desk, Miner Lounge
• Posters were put up successfully outside the
  Grand Hall and in Miner Lounge.
• The issue with our posters for the Pub is that
  they were too edgy the Pub has school groups
  and families come in during the summer and during
  the daytime. Poster campaign was rejected by
  managerial decision.

12
Recycling at Pub

• Our main goal was to limit the number of trash
  cans in convenient locations and replace them
  with more prominent recycling bins for glass
  bottles
• Pub already had several recycling bins in place
  a small station next to the bar, and a large bin
  by the back door
• Unfortunately, in doing our waste audits of pub
  we noticed that these recycling bins often
  contain trash from pub patrons

13
Methodology

• We performed four waste audits of pubs trash
  before instituting our initiative, and two
  afterwards
• To perform these audits, we used a spring scale
  with a 100 pound capacity in 1 pound increments
• We waited until pub closed on our audit nights,
  then took two representative trash cans out to
  the loading dock in the back, separated the
  waste, and weighed individual items
• We also performed three audits of the RMC
  upstairs before our initiative, and three
  afterwards, in the same manner and using bins
  from outside Sammys and the Grand Hall

14
Data Pre-Initiative Pub

• This is some of the data that we collected from
  our initial audits of Willys Pub

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Data Pre-Initiative - Upstairs

• This is the initial data that we collected from
  the upstairs of the RMC

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Data Analysis Pre-initiative Data - Pub

• Of Pubs waste stream that we audited, a full
  24.2 was recyclable glass
• 16 of the waste stream was non-recyclable 6
  Plastic
• This showed that a significant reduction in the
  waste stream was possible by making glass
  recycling more accessible, and that a further,
  even greater benefit could be reaped by finding
  affordable recyclable 1 or 2 plastic cups

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Data Analysis Pre-Initiative Data Upstairs RMC

• The glass in these audits makes up only 2.2 of
  the total waste stream.
• Aluminum and recyclable plastics are minimal,
  although higher than they should be considering
  the proximity of these bins to the recycling bins
  outside the Grand Hall (bag 2 was less than five
  feet from the bins outside the Grand Hall)

18
Data Post-Initiative - Pub

• This is the data that we collected from Pub after
  installation of new bins

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Data Post-Initiative - Upstairs

• This is the Data that we collected from the
  upstairs of the RMC after putting up our poster
  campaign

20
Data Analysis Post-Initiative Data Pub

• In our post-initiative audits, the percentage of
  glass in Pubs waste was 6.7
• 6 Plastic constituted 10.4 of Pubs waste after
  the initiative

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Data Analysis Post-Initiative Data Upstairs

• The upstairs RMC trash contained 4.08 glass
• Again, aluminum and recyclable plastic were
  negligible.

22
Impact of Initiatives
23
Statistical Analysis Pub

• We performed a t-test on our Pub data to
  determine if the difference in means was
  statistically significant
• The t-value for our data was 32.62, while the
  t-value for significance at alpha.05 was 2.30
• This confirms that we have achieved a
  statistically significant reduction in the
  average percentage of glass in pubs waste stream.

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Statistical Analysis Upstairs

• The amount of glass recyclables in the upstairs
  waste stream actually increased, while the amount
  of recyclable plastic and aluminum remained very
  small throughout our auditing
• This seems to show that last years group had
  already succeeded in reducing the RMCs trashed
  recyclables.

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Conclusion

• We achieved success in our efforts to decrease
  recyclables in Pubs waste stream by our
  implementation of two new rollable recycling bins
• Unfortunately, our poster campaign for pub was
  rejected, so we could not measure the effect it
  would have had on recycling
• Our upstairs initiative has so far not proven
  statistically successful. However, we hope that
  this poster campaign will encourage recycling in
  the upstairs over the next several months or
  years
• There is much that can still be done for both pub
  and the upstairs of the RMC

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Suggestions for Future Research

• Future ENST 302 groups could focus on recycling
  efforts at Valhalla
• Additionally, since the 13th Street franchise in
  the RMC is new, the manager should be more
  amenable to suggestions such as recyclable
  smoothie cups
• Sammys also contributes a good deal to the waste
  stream, and could be a good location for a
  project
• Future ad campaigns will need to address the
  issue of more permanent signs for the upstairs
  RMC it was suggested that our laminated signs
  be framed
• Downstairs in the Pub, however, removable signs
  might be best (so they can be taken off for
  summer)
• We can put .pdf files of our posters online in
  the ENST 302 archives for future groups to use

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Contacts

• Pamelyn Shefman
• Eusebio Franco
• Frank Smith
• Ding Bowal