Recycling: The Business Facts from Bill Concannon
Had business affairs been asked to report on recycling in 1998, there would have been no story. Simmons recycled nothing — no paper, bottles or cans.
In the fall of 1998, students asked business affairs to start a program. The students wanted Simmons to be environmentally responsible. They wanted the community to do the right thing.
So in January of 1999, a small group of administrators visited every office on campus, handing out deskside recycling bins and unveiling a new paper recycling program. Our janitorial partners, Unicco, agreed to support the program, and took on the daily operation at no additional cost to the College. By the end of 1999 15 tons of mixed office paper had been collected and recycled.
We in business affairs were pleased. But in 1999, the EPA national average of materials diverted from the waste stream was 21.7%. Simmons was at 6.2%. It was a start, but we clearly had a long way to go.
By the end of 2002, the College was catching up. That year, the national recycling rate was 22.8%. and Simmons was at 17%.
In 2002 Staff Council and the Student Government Association formed environmental committees. The committees helped market a recycling program and pushed business affairs to provide receptacles for recycling beverage containers. It was the students’ idea — Our job at business affairs was to put it into action.
We joined the Institution Recycling Network (called the IRN) and asked for their help in getting this new program off the ground. Simmons was one of IRN’s first member institutions. Now this co-op has over 130 members — colleges, universities, and hospitals across New England.
The IRN agreed to help the College start recycling beverage containers, but warned us that it would be a challenging part of our recycling efforts.
In the recycling industry, beverage containers are considered a ‘low impact’ commodity — high cost, low recovery. They are often contaminated with sugar or chemicals, requiring extensive sorting at the recycling facility. Often bottles are too contaminated and end up in a landfill. One ceramic coffee mug in a truck full of glass bottles will cause the entire load to be rejected at the recycling facility. So while beverage container recycling is important for us in terms of visibility on campus, it has a low return on investment in terms of program cost and environmental benefits.
We at business affairs wanted run a program that was environmentally strong and financially solid. We learned that by focusing our efforts on ‘high impact’ commodities, we would see a reduction in overall waste management spending as well as remove materials that are highly toxic or physically large from the waste stream.
One issue we have recently focused on is the disposal of computers, which is not only a serious environmental issue, but also an important social issue. Typically, containers of electronics are shipped to the Pacific Rim, where environmental controls are non-existent and workers are paid pennies to work under medically hazardous conditions.
The recycling facility that accepts Simmons electronics provide documentation to ensure that our electronics are disposed of responsibly. And as with all of their other programs, we are encouraged to tour their facilities and see what happens to our materials.
In conjunction with MASCO, we pushed the IRN to expand programs in all of the previously mentioned areas. Today hospitals and colleges throughout the Longwood area are recycling beverage containers, cardboard, and electronics.
But here’s the best part. Seven years ago, when a building needed to be emptied of old furniture before a renovation or construction project, it went into storage somewhere — never to be seen again. Or it went into a dumpster and ended up in a landfill. No more-in 2003 we started using metal, wood and mattress dumpsters, and these materials were recycled.
And today our strategy on building cleanouts has completely changed. For example, the clean out of the old SOM location at 409 Commonwealth Avenue a couple of years ago resulted in nearly 23,000 pounds of furniture shipped directly to relief efforts in Spanish Town, Jamaica, which had just experienced a series of devastating hurricanes. Our furniture was used to help rebuild the community.
This afternoon, I feel confident in saying that when we cleanout the library building, 99% of the furniture will be recycled in some way. Some will be reused on campus or sold in a community ‘tag sale’, some will be donated to local libraries, after-school programs, and small businesses, and the rest will be sent to areas — like Jamaica — in need of disaster relief or economic assistance.
But wait, there’s more! Books are donated to various organizations through Better World Books. The Library also gives books to local schools and libraries like Roxbury Community College and the Winthrop School. And GSLIS, in conjunction with a grant they received to provide training to Iraqi librarians, has shipped over 400 pounds of books, periodicals and journals no longer needed by the Library to their students in Iraq.
Technology has donated over 1700 computers, monitors, and other equipment to public schools, community centers, and other non-profit organizations in our area. These initiatives are happening because there are individuals around campus who, on their own and without fanfare, are passionate about doing the right thing.
So where are we now? To date, we have recycled over 400 tons of materials. What does that ‘look like?’ If all of that recycled or reused material was on one side of a scale, and every Simmons student, faculty, and staff member was on the other side, the scale would be balanced.
Simmons has saved 350 gallons of oil and over 4,000 trees. And almost 6,000,000 gallons of water.
In 2005, the College’s recycling rate was 27%. That puts us in the top 3% of organizations in the Boston area. And we are poised to do more.
The EPA’s recycling goal is 35% by 2008, and we at business affairs want to beat it and we’ve got some ideas to do so — we’ll be working with the Facilities department on ways to expand our work into construction and demolition projects, and we will ensure that any time we trade out equipment, we require vendors to dispose of the components responsibility and track the weight for our records.
We’ve had a lot of success. But this program is just a part of a much broader idea that is coming into focus at Simmons. Let me tell you about a meeting I attended a couple of weeks ago.
The new Sustainability Committee at Simmons held an open meeting, which was standing-room only: faculty, staff, and students crowded into the room. The subject of recycling came up.
This gave me an opportunity to tell the group some of the things we’ve been doing over the past 7 years. And they were surprised. And then, Rich Gurney asked me what the group could do to support our efforts. It was the last question I expected, and I had to think a minute. By the end of the meeting our first ever ‘move out’ recycling drive had taken shape. We are collecting batteries, small appliances, clothing, and books from our student moving out of the residence halls. I got them the boxes and arranged for the materials to be picked up, they did the rest.
So now it gets fun — we’ve come full circle. The students who were here 7 years ago pushed us, and now, today’s students are pushing us again. They are pushing us to educate and engage the community in our efforts. So, this time, it won’t be about community passion and administrative action. We can work towards that 35% goal — and together we’ll make it.
—Bill Concannon is Director of Business Affairs