In this week’s post, we highlight our effort at Friday night’s Tiger Sustainability Night double-header basketball game at which we partnered with Campus Dining and student EcoReps to recover food scraps at our first major event. Check out the below photo essay to learn more:
[EcoRep and Biodigester Operational Assistant, Wesley Wiggins ’21, staffs one of the five “Zero Waste Stations” stationed around the gym. Wesley and the other EcoReps instructed fans on how to properly sort their unwanted materials into either “Landfill,” “Recycling,” “Compost” or “Liquids”]
[About 15 gallons of compostable material was diverted from the landfill over the course of the night, consisting mostly of napkins, paper plates, popcorn, and…
[… 22 pizza boxes! Although cardboard from pizza boxes is technically a recyclable material, once it becomes saturated with pizza grease, it can no longer be recycled because the absorbed oil interferes with standard recycling processes. However, greasy cardboard pizza boxes can be shredded and composted at our facility. They will be gradually added over the course of this week and will act as a supplemental carbon source. ]
Weekly Data: 2/18 – 2/22
Unfortunately, we were unable to use our scale last week due to a temporary data transmission issue, so the data represented below are estimates. On the bright side, we were able to leverage several months of experience and data to assist in making informed estimates!
Although we received the same number of food scraps totes as the week prior in which we processed around 3,000 lbs., we estimated that we loaded a few hundred pounds over 3,000 lbs. because several of the totes were heavier than usual, most likely because of last Wednesday’s snow storm which led to an earlier closure time for our campus cafes.
| Food | Wood shavings (BA/CS) | % BA/CS |
Compost Off-loaded | |
| Week Totals (lbs.) | 3,334 | 1026 | 31% | 3,000 |
| CUMULATIVE (lbs) | 52,636 | 15,939 | 30% | 41,500 |