The quest for zero waste at SFU
By Esther Tung
Photo By Mark Burnham
In step with Metro Vancouver’s plans to divert 70 per cent of its waste from landfills by 2015, SFU has launched its most comprehensive waste reduction strategy to date, with a strong focus on composting. If you’ve eaten at McKenzie Cafeteria or Tim Hortons in the past month, you’ll have noticed that four-bin sorting stations have replaced traditional trash bins, with waste sorted into organic matter, recyclables, refundables, and one more bin for anything that doesn’t fit into the first three categories. Twenty-two such stations are located across campus in high-traffic areas, with 15 more on the way.
After launching the Go Green Container Exchange Program last semester, this is the next step in reducing campus waste and increasing SFU’s visibility as a sustainable campus. “As a research institution, we should be moving further ahead in the curve than the region’s goals,” said Sarah Stoner, the acting sustainability coordinator. Up until this year, SFU was one of the only major research institutions in the region that had yet to begin composting. UBC built an in-vessel composter several years ago that processes up to five tonnes of organic waste each day, and UVic’s volunteer-operated office compost program has been in place for over a decade.
Composting is the final step in closing the crucial ecological loop that turns end products — our waste — back into raw material for other uses. Organic matter in landfills represents nutrients and minerals that are taken away from the soil and get stuck in the loop due to landfill design. Landfills are required to be lined with clay soil to prevent ground and water pollution from any toxic material in the trash. This design still allows for organic matter to break down over time, but the clay lining and the conventional method of heaping new loads of trash over the old depletes the landfill of oxygen. This means that the material is broken down by anaerobic bacteria, which survive only in the absence in oxygen. The bacteria give off methane — a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide — as they digest organic matter. Compost heaps, on the other hand, get mixed constantly to introduce oxygen to the environment. Methane levels in a healthy compost heap become negligible, and this marginally negative outcome is far outweighed by the fertile end product that remains, which some call ‘black gold’, that can then be sold to farmers and landscaping companies or individual households.
Up to 94 per cent of SFU’s waste can be diverted from landfills, with 54 per cent (650 tonnes) being compostable and the remaining 40 per cent recyclable, according to Kimberly Irwin, volunteer coordinator for the Sustainability Advisory Committee (SAC). The SAC plays a large role in coordinating the compost initiative, working closely with other campus operations and student groups in doing so. The blue bins for paper recycling that are usually paired with a trash can are often mistaken as a catch-all for plastics and refundables, and the new sorting stations are designed to minimize such confusion as much as possible. Each bin in the station is clearly labeled, often accompanied with graphics showing what common campus items can or cannot be in there. A safe rule: if you’ve taken a bite out of it, it can be composted. However, Stoner stresses the fragility of the compost heaps, which have little tolerance for contamination. “We want to maximize waste diversion, but contaminating the waste stream would just be counter-productive. Our message to students is that if you’re in a hurry or are still confused about how to separate your trash, to place it with the regular garbage instead.”
“We want to maximize waste diversion, but contaminating the waste stream would just be counter-productive. Our message to students is that if you’re in a hurry or are still confused about how to separate your trash, to place it with the regular garbage instead.”
– Sarah Stoner, acting sustainability coordinator
For those who have the time to learn, look out for bright green T-shirts by the sorting stations. Zero Waste ambassadors are usually stationed around them in high-traffic zones to help people understand the new bins. The student volunteers are also involved in other awareness tactics, such as getting people to sign composting pledges and classroom facilitation.
The sorting stations, like the old trashcans, are emptied out every two to three hours, minimizing fruit flies. While some have pointed out that leaving composting bins indoors, which is done because of Burnaby Mountain’s bear and coyote population, may cause unpleasant smells, Stoner said there has yet to be any complaints. “Besides, whether organic matter is in a separate bin or not, it’ll still be indoors.”
Another feature of the waste diversion strategy is co-mingled recycling, which means no more scratching your head over the mysterious numbering system for plastics — all plastics, numbers one through seven, go into the same bin at the stations, and are sorted out for recycling at the facility. These sorting stations can be found in busier corridors and most main dining areas, though there are none in Cornerstone vendors and SFSS-owned operations such as Higher Grounds.
The compost initiative is spearheaded by the Sustainability Network, a working group recently formed between the SAC, Sustainable SFU, and a handful of smaller groups, all with the mandate of creating a more sustainable campus.
The SAC was formed in 2005 when the Sustainable Campus Coalition (now Sustainable SFU) expressed an interest in working more formally with SFU’s senior administration, partially to give recognition to the many unofficial projects that were being undertaken at the time. Many positions are held by staff members from other departments, such as facilities, IT services, and campus planning and development. Representatives from faculty and the student body sit on the committee as well. SAC is an advisory body, and no money passes through their hands directly. Rather, they liaise with the vice-president, finance and administration, currently Pat Hibbits, to advise on and create recommendations for funding on sustainability initiatives. Money goes directly into the Sustainability Fund, handled by facilities.
Hibbits said she generally takes a hands-off approach and does not micromanage funds once they have been granted, as was the case with the $200,000 one-time boost to the Sustainability Fund this fiscal year. The bonus allowed the SAC to hire support staff and undertake larger infrastructure projects, such as Irwin’s position and the composting program. Neither Stoner nor Hibbits was able to speak on whether this higher level of funding could be maintained into the next years. The Go Green Container Exchange program is also under the SAC’s coordination as well, with funding from SFU Ancillary Services.
Both these campus-wide programs are preceded by their smaller-scale counterparts on Rez. SFU picked up the container exchange program after it proved to be a success in the dining hall. And while the Sustainability Network’s composting program extends to all Chartwells locations on campus itself, there is no sorting station anywhere on residence, including the Chartwells-owned Dining Hall. “Rez is treated as a separate entity from the campus, due to having different needs,” said Erika Zell, a residence area coordinator who also supervises the Eco-committee that implemented these programs. The lone compost bin is located outdoors behind the dining hall, which sees very little use due to the bin’s low traffic. Thomas Booker, a student who lives in rez, wrote in to The Peak with a complaint highlighting this issue, correlating its use to awareness levels, which is likely worsened by its hidden location.
But if you build it, they will come. The pilot weeks of campus composting have been successful, according to Irwin, and students have been receptive to being educated on the new bins. Other than having a team of volunteer ambassadors on standby, surveys have been conducted, and there are even more plans to expand on outreach. “We still need to broaden the amount of people we are talking to, so we’ll be making announcements at the beginning of classes as well, especially the big first-year science, business, and arts courses,” said Irwin. A public waste audit is also being considered once the program has had some time to take root. “It’s pretty dirty work. It’s digging through garbage and calculating what is going into what stream, but it’s very helpful in determining how efficient your program is,” said Irwin.
The need to integrate a sophisticated waste diversion strategy to campus life stems partially from Metro Vancouver’s pressing issue of dwindling landfill space. Metro Vancouver has a particularly aggressive composting program in place to meet its goal, with nine municipalities now offering curbside pick-up for food scraps, in addition to yard trimmings, with North Vancouver set to join in as the 10th this May. 2015 may seem like a tight schedule to keep to, but it’s for good reason, since the Cache Creek landfill recently reached capacity and is currently undergoing renovations that will double its current size to the approximate area of 85 hectares, or the same number of rugby playing fields. Meanwhile, some of our waste is being transported long distances to U.S. landfills instead.
Metro Vancouver has been pushing to build more waste-to-energy facilities in the Lower Mainland as part of its campaign. A methane capture plant is now underway at the Cache Creek landfill, which will burn methane gas given off by the garbage and convert it into electricity. Waste-to-energy plants could also look more similar to the existing Burnaby incinerator, which burns garbage to make steam. While the regions frame waste-to-energy plants as an efficient means of reducing garbage by turning it into a resource, they are by no means clean enough for your backyard. The CBC reported that the Burnaby plant is one of the worst offenders in the region for sulphur dioxide emissions.
With 40 per cent of Metro Vancouver’s waste being compostable — that’s an estimated 190,000 tonnes from residential areas alone — there is much incentive to turn to composting first to reduce the pressure on landfills. A waste-to-energy plant will cough up more pollution over time as its facilities deteriorate. Composting, on the other hand, has no foreseeable negative externalities that could outweigh its benefits, be it restoring fertility to the land, or just better tasting blueberries.
