ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES COMMITTEE
March 12, 2003
Umpqua Room

Attendees: Bob Jones, Christine Thompson, Karyn Kaplan, Bitty Roy, Bob Jones, Jo Rodgers, Joni Herbst, Julia Heydon, Levi Strom, Dean Livelybrooks, Steve Mital, J.R. Gaddis & Guest: Mike Sims

EMU Food Services Waste Audit - web site: http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~ecostudy

Steve introduced Mike Sims, project manager and GTF in Environmental Studies. Fall term students began researching case studies from other universities. They saw mainly three options to reducing waste - composting, encouraging use of reusable food ware, and vendor service options. The week of January 27th was spent gathering the waste - 9.67 cubic yards (a little over three dumpsters) of trash was sorted into thirteen categories. Mike provided a profile that graphed these categories. A little under four yards of the total volume was compostable, and 1.99 yards of the total volume was beverage containers and lids. Plastic bags, mainly from Subway, comprised 13% of the waste by volume. A negligible amount of recyclable material was found.

Strategies for reduction listed on the profile: By targeting key materials, significant amount of waste could be reduced or diverted from the waste stream. Eliminating disposable beverage containers and implementing a compost system would reduce the total volume by 67.47%.

• Compost all food waste and paper products, 41.1% of total volume.
• Increase recycling of plastics by establishing a single stream.
• Reduce use of disposable beverage containers through Durable Food Ware and Service Changes.
• Educate EMU users and vendors through poster displays and demonstration project.

The driving vision for this project is to get people to think about waste as a potential resource. The next steps will be to conduct surveys of customers, talk to vendors, and other universities. A demonstration project will occur in April. They will also try to find ways to get more people to use campus recycle mugs. One idea is to advertise that the refund money would be funneled into an account and donated, or place a jar next to registers for donations to Food for Lane County.

Karyn suggested that students also look at waste generation differences among the vendors. They are charged the same amount, however Subway for example, generates more than Holy Cow or Andrew Smash. There are no guidelines and no reward for waste reduction. She also hopes the project will include a cost benefit analysis.

Other ideas to encourage waste reduction were discussed such as posting pictures of a person with a reusable mug standing by a stack of 365 paper cups, or next to the amount of trash one person produces each year, or charge a fifty-cent "eco" tax on beverages in disposable containers.

Announcements

• The UO sustainability web site will be up and running by Earth Week.
• Bring Recycling will have a computer and TV round up in May.
• This summer the paper cup contract is up for negotiation in the EMU. Subway’s owner is willing to use a different kind of cup, but she is bound by franchise rules. However, if UO required that Subway use of a certain type of material in order to remain at the EMU, it could supercede the franchise rules.

Karyn asked if the subcommittee(s) could make, or provide text for, an Earth Day poster. It was suggested that the display board housed in John Baldwin’s office might be used. EIC could get some exposure by staffing a table on April 22 with information and an environmental awareness game. Reusable mugs could be given away as prizes.

Subcommittee Reports:

CCAT shall henceforth be known as CASL - Center for the Advancement of Sustainable Living. A mission statement has been written, and the group will be meeting with Dan Williams to discuss progress. During the spring they will work on getting more students involved.

Transportation is working on creating a flyer of existing alternatives available to the campus community. They will bring a draft back to the committee for review prior to meeting with Rand Stamm. It is important to keep in mind that there are overarching policies for the university and then implementation of the policies. A lot has already been done, however, more can be accomplished through working together and increasing awareness. This flyer could also be distributed at new employee orientation.

Recycled Paper Policy Revision

Added at the beginning:

As a subpolicy of the University of Oregon’s Campus Environmental Policy, …

Executive Orders were changed to the current, stronger orders: EO-98-07 and EO-00-07

Removed references to Oregon State contracting manuals to keep it current with existing laws.

The committee suggested the following language replace the third paragraph revision:

The default paper will be chlorine-free recycled paper with 100% post consumer content. However, at a minimum, all University paper products, shall consist of a minimum of 50% recycled content with at least 30% post consumer content and be chlorine free. Use of heavily dyed and neon paper is discouraged.

Additional comments and proposed changes will be discussed via the list serve.

The next Environmental Issues Committee meeting will be held 3:00 – 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 8^th in the EMU Board Room.