Project Gas Station Recycling Crazy People From Moscow Who Somehow Got Their Hands on Robotics Equipment

Why is trash a problem? Fills up landfills, potentially contaminates land uses up natural space US: 4.3 lbs per person per day; 220 million tons / year; 3,500 landfills [1] US: now 40% more pp than 1960; Toxic for environment More pollution

Recycling A current and effective solution for some waste management 5 step process 1.Collection and sorting 2.Grinding 3.Cleaning 4.Melting 5.Reforming Used all over the world

Problems with Recycling If the population doesn’t sort correctly, it is harder and more expensive to process. Not all people are open to recycling and/or don’t know much about it. - Some people don’t have access to recycling in certain situations and therefore don’t. Some people wouldn’t normally deliver their recycling to the drop-off center, and may also not have it collected, resulting in it not getting to the recycling center at all.

So… The problem we chose was that people sometimes don’t have access to recycling

More About the Problem In some cases, people don’t have easy access to recycling bins in their everyday lives. Also, people may recycle regularly, but when traveling may not have easy access to recycling bins. In either case, people would just throw recyclable objects away in the absence of anywhere to recycle.

Our proposed solution is to place recycling bins at gas stations as an easy place for people to recycle.

More about the Solution We would collaborate with gas station chains and local managers to place recycling bins at their gas stations for people to recycle. Accepting only plastic #1 bottles and aluminum cans would make the most sense, because that is mostly what gas stations sell Moscow Recycling also gets more money from these products than others. The recycling would be emptied once a week by (insert discussed solution here)

Possible problems that may arise The gas station managers would not agree because of the cost People wouldn’t recycle, and may ignore the bins or simply not notice them.

Ways to address these problems We would offer to fund the project ourselves, and get sponsors such as Coca-Cola and Pepsi, putting their advertisements on the outside of the bins. We would place lots of signs and notices all around the gas stations. An incentive rewards program would also get more participants.

How this would impact the community The Moscow Recycling Center would benefit from the added valuable material for recycling, and get more money The community would be more sustainable. Less trash to ship out = more money saved for the community. This would help raise awareness about recycling, and in the long-run, bring in even more recycling.

What Gas Stations Think Stinker Store: (Insert interview responses) A&W: Chevron: Sinclair:

Comparison People throw away more trash The community is more trashy World/Community Without Our Idea World/Community With Our Solution People throw away more trash The community is more trashy The Moscow Recycling and economy have less money Less trash is thrown away The community has less trash and is less polluted The Moscow Recycling and economy have more money and improve

Long-Term Effects If we put our idea into effect, ideally it would spread beyond Moscow, ID. If all gas stations had recycling bins, and collected recycling, then the world would be less affected by trash.

This would not be too hard to put into effect This would not be too hard to put into effect. All we need is a few recycling bins, and a way to collect all the recycling, and the world benefits.

Thank you. From Crazy People From Moscow Who Somehow Got Their Hands on Robotics Equipment

References / Sources https://center.sustainability.duke.edu/resources/green-facts-consumers/how-much-do-we-waste-daily