For the last 3 years, Waste Control Services has been working with the Mulgrave School in West Vancouver to audit the waste and recycling collected onsite at the school. The audit serves to identify what items are being correctly sorted or incorrectly sorted into the school’s recycling streams, and identifies education opportunities by material stream and by location in the school. Commonly confusing items are addressed, and discussed with school representatives, who then work with the procurement department and implement changes and education strategies.
Some key strategic changes included adding organic streams in all bathrooms diverting all the paper towels from landfill, and replacing all of the school cafeteria’s PLA #7 plastics with more readily compostable paper food packaging products that prove less confusing to students when sorting.
The result after 3 years of collaborative waste diversion efforts was a successful overall contamination reduction of 26% across all recycling & waste streams at the school!
WCS offers basic and comprehensive waste auditing services that can be catered to your needs and your budget. If your school or business is interested in having your recycling and waste streams audited to learn more about what is being correctly and incorrectly sorted by students, or your staff, contact our team at [email protected] to inquire about options and auditing costs.
Author: Charmaine Wu