VNR: UH Mānoa students sort waste to celebrate Earth Day, promote sustainability
University of Hawaiʻi at MānoaLink to video and sound (details below): https://go.hawaii.edu/Xri
WHAT: In celebration of Earth Day, the University of Hawaiʻi Office of Sustainability conducted a waste audit of six buildings on the UH Mānoa campus. Students, faculty and staff participated in the event of sorting, sifting and counting thrown away trash in garbage and recycling bins around each building.
WHEN: Friday, April 21, 10 a.m.–4 p.m.
WHO: More than 80 UH Mānoa students, faculty and staff signed up.
WHERE: UH Mānoa campus behind Kuykendall Hall.
WHY: To help promote sustainability at the university, a waste audit will help identify major components of UH’s waste stream, provide data to inform institutional efforts to reduce waste and help address real-world challenges facing our campus.
OTHER FACTS:
- A waste audit involves sorting through the waste streams, weighing and categorizing the different types of materials found. The volume and weight of each category is then measured and compared against the total volume and weight of waste surveyed. Volume and weight directly impact costs associated with managing waste streams.
- Teams will conduct audits of all the UH Mānoa buildings by the end of the year.
- Findings are expected to help provide leaders with the data to determine how to improve trash organization, recycling and reduction of waste.
VIDEO BROLL: trt 1:20
Various shots of students sorting trash
SOUNDBITES:
Navin Tagore Erwin, UH Zero-Waste Coordinator
(:11) “Pretty much the start of a zero waste institution starts with figuring out what we're doing to begin with. So this is really step one and we've got a long way to go. But we also got a whole lot of potential.”
(:08) “So what we're trying to do is design interventions to, to cut down waste and we need data to do. So that data all starts here.”