The SGA passed a resolution urging the administration to expand composting to residence halls in their sixth legislative meeting last Wednesday. It highlighted the need for Facilities Management, Residential Facilities, and Resident Life to develop an implementation plan in conjunction with the SSC, starting with a pilot program in two to three dorms next year.
It’s about time. Composting is the sleeping giant that recycling was in the early-2000s. It’s hard to believe, but in 2005, the University only recycled 17% of its waste and the SGA was struggling to find funds to cover recycling bins on campus. In 2008, we were lagging in RecycleMania, and in 2011, we were just piloting single stream recycling in residence halls. The student voice has brought us to where we are today: boasting a 78% landfill diversion rate, ranking 66 out 273 schools in the Grand Champion category of RecycleMania (the top 25%), and approaching a residence halls composting pilot. Just as recycling penetrated the campus over the past 10 years, through concerted advocacy by student groups, negotiations with administrators and slow-going policy changes in governing bodies, we now begin the battle for widespread composting facilities - though hopefully in half the time.
The thing is, it’s going to happen. The campus will have pervasive recycling and composting infrastructure throughout the diners, Stamp, residence halls, academic buildings, and the grounds, it’s just a matter of how soon we want it.
Our generation is realizing that we need to be cognizant of the impacts our daily actions and choices have on the world around us and our species’ survival potential. Sustainability is no longer an option in the face of anthropogenic climate change. Recycling has become so popular because it just makes sense - why use energy to produce new paper, plastic, and metal when you can use the same energy, but without the material input costs, rehabbing existing paper, plastic, and metal? Composting is inevitable as well because of how obvious it is - by diverting organic waste, we reduce the amount of trash in the landfill and lower methane emissions while creating lush, beautiful soil to use in a garden to create fresh food. Both recycling and compost are intuitively simple circular processes. The natural systems of the earth function in cycles and we should too.
Students around campus are voicing their support of this proverbial phoenix, too. Last year, after the SSC’s month-long “What Will You(MD) Do?” sustainability pledge where we got students to commit to environmentally friendly behaviors, we collected essay submissions detailing why participants signed up, why sustainability is important to them, and what sustainable change they’d like to see on campus. A significant portion supported expanding compost from the diners and Stamp into the residence halls, seeing as a majority of the to-go containers offered are compostable, and students take them to-go, but have a difficult time finding any compost… where they go. The support we’ve received for waste reduction continued into this year, when the SSC polled 605 students on what broad campus sustainability issue was most important to them: energy use/climate change mitigation, waste reduction, sustainable food, water reduction, or sustainable education/awareness. Waste reduction came in second only two percent behind energy use, garnering 173 votes, with numerous people citing the availability of compost as an issue.
Luckily, the sleeping giant is waking. Residential Facilities is hosting a waste audit this fall which will update data on our waste stream that was last investigated in 2002. At that point, leftover and uneaten food scraps accounted for 39% of the materials headed to the landfill, with 2.2 million pounds disposed of annually. Though the numbers are outdated, the fact that we still don’t have compost bins in residence halls is not, and the new waste audit will likely yield similar results. The outside contractor that performs the audit will also research other schools and provide a recommendation for what a residence hall composting program could look like, at which point Facilities Management will begin establishing needed infrastructure. Resident Life’s role will become promoting the pilot through educational posters and encouragement of participation. A probable next step will be polling of residents across campus to find out whether they’d like to have it available, whether they’d want their hall to participate, and if they could see themselves adopting the habit. Hopefully, students respond positively to the idea. Now, it’s up to not just environmentally-conscious students, but all students on campus to affirm this change if it is to occur.
-Annie Rice, ENSP '17