To date, the Zero Waste Initiative has strategically deployed over 1,500 new Zero Waste bins throughout all campus buildings, in central office spaces, corridors, and lobbies. These new three-stream bin clusters provide separate receptacles for compostable, recyclable and landfill material, and serve as the backbone of the centralized waste collection program.
In order to promote proper waste sorting, reduce the usage of plastic bin liners and raise waste awareness, we have removed bins from classrooms and we are now entering the phase of desk side bin choice.
Employees who currently have desk side bins can choose to either remove their waste bins and use the centralized Zero Waste clusters, or leave their desk side bin as-is and self-service (sort and empty) their desk side waste bins themselves. In both cases, the employee will be responsible for depositing their waste into the new Zero Waste clusters located in central office locations. Through this program, users are encouraged to properly sort their waste as it is generated.
There are multiple drivers for this initiative:
- CSUN sends an estimated 558,000 pounds of food waste to the landfill each year. Properly disposing of food waste in the green Organics bin means it will be sent to a composting facility instead. This reduces greenhouse gas emissions from food that would have decomposed in a landfill, and recycles valuable nutrients into a fertile topsoil amendment that is valuable to food growers.
- Approximately 30% of the waste in CSUN's landfill stream can actually be recycled, and it is cheaper to transport recyclable items than landfill waste. Placing recyclable items in the blue bin reduces waste hauling and sorting costs, and conserves finite resources such as petroleum and aluminum while reducing the demand for further resource extraction through mining, drilling and tree cutting.
- The CSU Sustainability Policy mandates that campuses seek to reduce the solid waste disposal rate by 50% by 2016, 80% by 2020 and move towards zero waste.
- CSUN's Zero Waste Plan establishes the goal of a 95% reduction in landfill waste by 2025. The plan outlines numerous strategies and programs focused on source reduction, education, composting and recycling.
- California Assembly Bill 1826 requires generators of more than four cubic yards of solid waste per week to arrange for recycling services specifically for organic waste. CSUN's new waste hauling contract includes service for organic material which is taken to a composting facility.