Recycling at the U of M, Twin Cities

I am seriously impressed by the magnitude of efforts being under taken by my University to recycle, reduce and reuse non-biodegradable waste throughout the campus and even outside it to some extent. Every campus building has separate bins for plastics, paper, glass and other trash. Even the dorm rooms have separate bins for each type of waste. Everywhere recycled tissue papers are used and various volunteering projects involving cleaning parks, rivers etc. are taken up. There are a number of student groups that focus on sustaining the environment and how can we as students contribute to the cause.  

There is a re-use program, which relieves 250 university buildings of unwanted materials, fixtures and supplies. They redistribute furniture and equipment valued at over $200,000 to U of M departments each year. They recycle unwanted steel, aluminum, wood, cardboard and paper.  The U of M recycling program collects wastes separately using the color coded QUAD system.

An event called, Beautiful U Day brings together students, faculty and staff for beautification and sustainability events on all University of Minnesota campuses. Last year’s Twin Cities campus event introduced the It All Adds Up program’s energy conservation initiative, setting the goal of reducing energy consumption by five percent by the end of 2010. This goal was surpassed in March. The It All Adds Up message is very popular on campus, seen on bright green bands and T-shirts. During our welcome week we were taken to Saint Paul campus where we signed up for their mailing list and sign a pledge in which we were asked about the different ways in which I will be contributing towards sustaining the environment. We were also given used folders that are really very useful to me. I said that I will be taking the stairs instead of elevators whenever possible (the fact that I live on the second floor helps in maintaining it). Also that I’d be using the dorm room bins and throw the garbage accordingly. I’d try and save as much electricity as I can. I make sure to switch off lights and other electric appliances when not needed. I know that this isn’t much but I’ve seen that people here keep the lights on even when they are not in the room, because they don’t care and they don’t have to pay their electric bills separately. But then coming from a place like India where lots of places still do not have access to electricity, and power cuts are really common, I am aware of the need to use it judiciously.

What is the need for recycling?

Any non-biodegradable i.e. non-organic material that cannot be broken down by micro-organisms if accumulated in excess amounts is going to be harmful to the environment.  About millions of tones of plastics are produced annually though most of it goes into landfills, substantial amounts end up in the sea. This affects almost every living organism either directly or indirectly. Some trash like glass is biodegradable but it will take about a million years to degrade. Producing these use up a lot of our most non- renewable resources and thus the need for this production to be controlled. Also their feasibility and easy accessibility make them really useful and convenient. Therefore completely eliminating their usage is impossible.And the most eco-friendly solution to do so is recycling.

 I always thought that plastics float around on water. Well it’s not that what I thought was wrong, but when we see video footages of huge amounts of plastics and other non-biodegradable wastes floating in the sea, and start feeling concerned for the dolphins and other sea creatures, we need to know that this waste is a fraction of what actually exists in the sea. As plastics stay in the sea, they become fouled by marine organisms and this alters their overall density, due to which they sink to the seabed.  And obviously a lot of sea creatures eat this waste or suffer by getting entangled in them. Eating these wastes lead to suffocation or blockage of digestive tract. Also Japanese research shows that the plastics floating on the surface are attractive to hydrophobic chemicals or contaminants such as pesticides. These stick to the plastics and enter the food chain when marine animals eat them. A recent US report stated that about 100,000 sea animals die every year just because of plastics which account for 60-80% of the waste.

Although a lot of activities are being taken up by people from around the world because of the increasing awareness of ill-effects of plastics.  In comparison to the accumulated amount, the efforts are not sufficient to control the damage. Most people despite knowing about the situation do not implement recycling into their lives and as a result in many countries, non-biodegradable waste accumulate on the streets and are eaten by stray cattle, they become breeding grounds of mosquitoes and play a major role in spreading diseases like malaria, typhoid, diarrhea, cholera etc.

Personally even I fell into the same category before I saw my neighbor’s dog die because of choking due to some plastic that he ate from the streets. I know that this was pretty lame, that I started caring for the environment after I was affected personally, but then I hope others are not like me.