Plastic, not always fantastic: Finding ways to reduce use and recycle plastic bags, film and wrap on campus

Kate Hartsel

 The Wisconsin Wrap Recycling Action Program (WRAP) is a new statewide public awareness campaign designed to empower motivated communities to contribute to a common goal: to make plastic film packaging a commonly recycled material with a strong and ever-growing recycling rate. Wrap joins together communities and organizations to lead the charge to share information about the opportunities to recycle plastic film.

 Indianhead Enterprises:  Indianhead Enterprises, Inc. is a private not-for-profit organization which provides vocational services to individuals with disabilities and other barriers to employment, promoting independence, empowerment and the development of skills needed for successful employment and self-sufficiency.  Wisconsin DNR  American Chemistry Council’s Flexible Film Recycling Group  GreenBlue’s Sustainable Packaging Coalition  UW-Stout  Trex ® In Dunn Country

Open House in Menomonie at Indianhead Enterprises

My students and I attended the open house.

An idea was born….why couldn’t we develop a similar partnership in Eau Claire….

 Reach Inc., a private not-for-profit organization which provides vocational services to individuals with disabilities and other barriers to employment, promoting independence, empowerment and the development of skills needed for successful employment and self-sufficiency.  Wisconsin DNR  UW-Eau Claire Housing and Residence Life  Trex ® In Eau Claire

Plastic film is thin polyethylene plastic used for wraps, packaging and commercial/retail use bags. It is sometimes called stretch film or shrink film. Most plastic film collected for recycling may carry either a #2 HDPE or #4 LDPE mark. Common commercial or industrial use examples include:  Shopping bags  Case, shrink and pallet (Stretch film) wraps  Film and bags designed to protect or transport merchandise  Bubble wrap, air packets shipping  Zipper type food storage bags

Baler Low cost Small Lightweight Easy to use Moveable Doesn’t require electricity to operate

Program: Provides employment for students Is a great learning opportunity for students Keeps a lot of material out of the landfill Is a great university- community collaboration

Providing innovative opportunities for adults and children with disabilities since 1963.

 Plastic bales are sold to Trex ® to be repurposed into patio materials, outdoor plastic furniture even bird houses.  90% of products Trex ® are made from recycled plastics from post-consumer bottle waste, or HDPE post industrial material.  Trex ® products made from 95% recycled materials save around 400 million pounds of plastic and wood scrap from landfills every year.  Trex ® does not harvest trees to create their products.  The Trex ® manufacturing processes recycle factory runoff and refuse back into the manufacturing line, and some plant hydraulics are powered by vegetable oil.  Trex is a local Wisconsin company so the plastic is not shipped a long way

We introduced the new plastic bag, wrap and film recycling program during move in. We created a door hanger to put on each residence hall room door that provided information on recycling. We installed bins in each of the hall lobbies.

We also put collection boxes under the tents and collected bags, film and wrap along with the cardboard.

We did a display and handed out information on the plastic recycling program in several of our halls.

To help publicize the new program, we created posters which were distributed to each RA for each wing of the residence halls. Plus we created flyers to put into the sustainability stalls in the bathroom of each wing.

Plastic: Maybe Not So Fantastic. We created a SEED education program that included information on our plastic bag and wrap program.

During the SEED program we encourage student to use reusable bags instead of plastic and they repurpose old T-shirts into reusable bags.

Residents got points during this recycling competition for recycling plastic bags/film and wrap and for not contaminating the bins.

We used a recycling bin we got “free” from MAX R as a prize for our RecycleMania competition.

Some of the bales created after the Give and Take Move Out Event.

We’ve expanded the program to include collecting behind the scenes plastic from our facilities department.

In we hope to expand the program throughout campus!