Students might throw their empty Coke bottles into recycling bins across campus without a second thought, but OU’s recyclables actually goes through a long process in order to help the environment.
Each morning housekeeping teams and physical plant custodial workers empty the recycling containers on campus into designated pick-up areas, said Amanda Hearn, physical plant spokesperson, in an e-mail.
The materials are then transported to OU’s recycling compound. Once it reaches the compound, each container is hand sorted and materials are organized into their appropriate bins like newspapers, aluminum cans and cardboard.
The sorting process is part of what makes OU’s recycling program successful, said Deborah Dalton, director of OU’s interdisciplinary perspectives on the environment program.
Once material is sorted, it is shredded and then stacked. Every eight days the companies GreenStar and Georgia Pacific pick up the materials. These companies use recycled materials to make consumer goods like T-shirts, carpets and containers, Hearn said.
“Recycling is not just a matter of putting cans in one spot and paper in one spot; there has to be a market for that material,” Dalton said.
But recycling goes beyond throwing a plastic bottle into a different bin than paper.
People who claim they recycle cannot just recycle material; they must also buy recycled material, Dalton said.
It’s easy to tell who is using recycled material and who isn’t, and many products are labeled if they use recycled material, said Daniel Terlip, president of OUr Earth.
“Over the past couple of years, OU’s recycling program has made vast improvements,” Terlip said.
OU is doing a good job publicizing the recycling program, and students are more aware of their ability to recycle on campus, Terlip said.
Over the past year OU has increased its recycled material by 28 percent, giving the refuse and recycling department 805 tons of material to recycle, Hearn said.
Hearn said the physical plant will adapt its resources as needed to keep up with increased amount of recycling.
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mburris 3 years, 1 month ago
ARCHitect,
This is the very initiative that Student Congress' Green Week is undertaking.
There are going to be events and tables set up all week in the union and on the south oval, not to mention the FREE concert featuring Nelo on Walker-Adams Mall on Thursday.
They will be selling shirts and taking donations for recycling bins on campus. All the money goes right to the cause. Student Congress doesn't see a dime of it.
I encourage you and everyone else to stop by and help support this great cause this week. It's $7 for a shirt, and it makes our campus more sustainable.
Look forward to seeing everyone come out to support Green Week '09!
Matt Burris Student Congress Representative.
ARCHitect 3 years, 1 month ago
There needs to be a recycle bin next to every trash bin on campus, both inside and outside of buildings.
ARCHitect 3 years, 1 month ago
Everywhere there is a trash bin on campus, inside of buildings and out, there should be a recycle bin next to it. And make it a recycle bin for all recyclables; having separate bins for aluminum, plastic, and paper just confuses people.