RU Enters 11th Annual "RecycleMania" Competition
Radford University will again answer the challenge to improve its recycling activities and efforts in the 11th annual RecycleMania contest.
For the third consecutive year, RU will join nine other universities in Virginia and nearly 400 colleges and universities nationally to promote waste reduction activities on their campuses. RU will report recycling and trash data over a 10-week period, beginning on Sunday, Jan. 23, and be ranked weekly against its peers in various criteria.
In 2010, RU collected more than 17 tons of recyclables and organics during the contest and boosted its cumulative recycling index to 17.75 percent from 11.62 percent in 2009.
“Last year, the Radford University community made a major move forward in its recycling habits,” said Stan Wilkinson, recycling coordinator. “We are eager to see if we can build on that success.”
Among its many other recycling initiatives, RU provides and services recycling receptacles in every campus building, composts all food waste from its Dalton Hall dining facility – this is done in conjunction with Chartwell’s, RU’s food service provider, and PME Composting of Floyd – recycles e-waste as part of a program with Apple Computers and is developing a “Zero-Waste” program for campus special events that will eliminate materials from those events from the waste stream.
Joining the RU Sustainability-led campaign in RecyleMania this year will be the Office of Residential Life and the RU Environmental Club, who will be helping with the contest’s promotional and educational outreach activities, said Wilkinson.
As a result of the 2010 RecycleMania competition, RU determined that each student, faculty or staff member recycled 9.61 pounds during the 10-week period and that each member of the RU community produced almost 54 pounds of municipal solid waste. Per person during the contest period, RU recycled more than five pounds of paper, 3.3 pounds of corrugated cardboard, more than a pound of bottles and cans and .75 pounds of food service organics.
According to RecycleMania organizers, the contest’s spirit of friendly competition sparked huge environmental gains in 2010. The total amount of recyclables and organic materials recovered during the competition added up to 84.5 million pounds, which in turn prevented the release of nearly 137,500 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MTCO2E). In real-world terms, this reduction in greenhouse gases is equivalent to the annual emissions from 23,850 passenger cars, electricity use of 15,140 homes, or the burning of 650 railcars worth of coal.