summary of lincoln elementary community waste audit on april 16th, 2014

8/11/2019 Summary of Lincoln Elementary Community Waste Audit on April 16th, 2014

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The Gaia Project

270 Rookwood Ave

Fredericton, NB

E3B 2M2

1 (506) 442-9030

www.thegaiaproject.ca

[email protected]

Lincoln

Elementary

CommunitySchool:Waste Audit Summary

April 16th, 2014

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Lincoln Elementary Community School: Waste Audit Summary

A summary of the results from the waste audit conducted on April 16th, 2013.

Copyright 2014 The Gaia Project. Last updated on April 22nd, 2014.

Commercial reproducon of The Gaia Project materials is prohibited without prior wrien permission

The Gaia Project is a charitable organizaon whose mission is to empower youth to make informed deci-

sions about energy and its impact on the environment.

We develop projects, provide professional development, technical support and ongoing project support for

teachers and students. Our projects aim to incorporate three key principles, which symbolise our focus on

realisc environmentalism.

1. Data-Informed Decisions We want students to be able to explain why, and quanfy the eect of

each decision they made along the way to their nal soluon.

2.

Economic Assessments We expect students to be able to assess the cost eecveness of their so-

luons, and be able to opmize their projects with limited budgets.

3. Environmental Impact and Lifecycle Assessments We need students to take a holisc view to their

projects. This means looking at their projects from cradle to grave, as opposed to just examining the

use phase, and acknowledging that greenhouse gas reducon is not the only environmental issue at

stake.

For more informaon, please visit www.thegaiaproject.ca / www.projetgaia.ca

The Gaia Project

270 Rookwood Avenue

Fredericton, NB

E3B 2M2

Canada

1 (506) 442-9030

[email protected]

This project was supported by donaons and grants from:

The McCain Foundaon

Environment Canadas EcoAcon Program

New Brunswick Department of Environment and Local Government Environmental Trust Fund

Fredericton Community Foundaon

Front Cover Credits

Wheelie BinsCaledonia Lane photo by Geof Wilson under a Creave Commons BY-ND 2.0 Licence

The Gaia Project www.thegaiaproject.ca


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WasteAuditSummary

Overview

The Gaia Project and Lincoln Elementary

Community School collaborated on a audit of

the schools waste on April 16th, 2014. Ms.

Bowies grade 5 class, Chrisne Cli-

Community School Coordinatorand The Gaia

Project sta examined the schools waste and

discussed ways to reduce the schools overall

waste footprint.

This audit can be follow up in the future by

another audit to assess how well

recommendaons and waste reducon

soluons have been implemented. This would

be done by comparing the results of this auditto the next one, to see if the overall amount of

waste per day is reduced, and whether there

are any specic changes in the waste categories

targeted.

The Process

For the current waste audit, the custodial sta

collected all of the garbage at the school on

April 15th, bagged it and placed it aside for use

in the waste audit.

Sorting categories

We decided on 6 sorng categories:

Paper

Recyclable plascs

Boles and Boxes

Milk Cartons

Compost

Garbage

Weighing and Sorting

Aer deciding on our 6 sorng categories,

students were provided with gloves, divided

into teams and provided with a kit of supplies.

Before any bags were opened, the weight of

each bag was recorded so that the starng

amount of waste was known and could be

checked against the nal amount.

Groups then opened the bags and sorted its

contents.

We subsequently weighed the contents of each

sorng category at the end of the audit. The

data from each group was entered into an excel

spreadsheet so that we could build a picture of

how much waste the school produces in a day

in total and in each of the 6 sorng categories.

Results

The total weight of waste collected from 1

typical school day was approximately 29 kg. ,

or approximately 63 lbs. You can nd the actual

weight from each sorng category (our raw

data) in Table 1 in the Appendix.

The total weight of waste by category can be

seen in the pie chart on the following page.

Photo courtesy of Lincoln Elementary Community

School website


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iaProject


Finally, the amount of waste collected and sorted

into each category has been projected forward to

provide an esmate of the waste produced on an

annual basis. Assuming 185 school days in a year,

Lincoln Elementary Community School produces

approximately 5,300 kg of waste annually. These

annual projecons can be found in Table 2 in the

Appendix. This is a very rough esmate.

Assuming 200 students that regularly aend

Lincoln Elementary Community School, each

student produces approximately 0.1 kg of waste

per day, and 24 kg annually.

Summary

Through the process of measuring how much and

what type of waste Lincoln Elementary

Community School produces, it was discovered

that on April 16th, 2014:

41% of the waste could have been

recycled. This includes paper, milk cartons,boles and boxes, and recyclable plasc.

44% of the waste was compostable

material.

15% of the waste was actual garbage that

needed to be there.

Recommendations

Ms. Bowies class, along with Chrisne Cli and

The Gaia Project, brainstormed a variety of

recommendaons that go toward reducing the

amount of waste generated at Lincoln

Elementary Community School. These are

described below:

Eat all of the food that came in your lunch.

Take what you cant eat back home for re-

use.

Bring your lunch in re-usable containers

and avoid keeping it in baggies.

Buy food in bulk or bigger containers to

reduce the waste associated with

individually wrapped items.

Start a worm composng program to

repurpose food waste into usable soil.

Re-use boxes and llable water boles.

Increase the number and visibility of

recycling bins, especially in the cafeteria

and snack areas.

Make noceable signage for recycling bins.

Use both sides of any paper being used.

Remind others about paper recycling and

recycling in general.

Re-purpose items (boxes, cardboard,

paper, boles, etc.) for use in arts and

cras.

Make posters or announcements to

encourage the three Rs, Reduce, Re-use,

and Re-cycle.

44%

21%

4%

10%

15%

6%

Compost

Milk Cartons

Bottles & BoxesRecyclable Plastics

Garbage

Paper

Lincoln Elementary

Community School:

Waste Types


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WasteAuditSummary

Contact Us

The Gaia Project is very interested in supporng

waste reducon and other energy-related

iniaves at Lincoln Elementary Community

School in any that we can. This includes geng a

start on any of the ideas generated by students

on the previous page.

I look forward to discussing this report with the

school soon!

Vanessa Paesani, Execuve Director

[email protected]

www.thegaiaproject.ca

1 (506) 442-9030


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Table 1. Weight (kg) per sorng category.

Table 2. Esmated annual weight (kg) per sorng class

Appendix

Sorng

Group

Compost (kg)

Milk Cartons

(kg)

Boles &

Boxes (kg)

Recyclable

Plascs (kg)

Garbage (kg)

Paper

(kg)

Total

(kg)

Earth 5.3 3.8 0.8 0.9 1.7 0.2 12.6

JET 2.6 0.1 0.1 0.3 0.9 0.4 4.4

CBE 0.9 0.0 0.1 0.9 0.5 1.0 3.4

The Lions 3.9 2.0 0.2 0.7 1.3 0.1 8.1

Total 12.7 5.9 1.2 2.8 4.4 1.6 28.5

Sorng Category Daily (kg) Annual (kg)

Compost 12.7 2,300

Milk Cartons 5.9 1,100

Boles & Boxes 1.2 220

Recyclable Plascs 2.8 510

Garbage 4.4 820

Paper 1.6 300

Total 28.6 5,250

summary of lincoln elementary community waste audit on april 16th, 2014

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