Recycling Revolution at Oxy

As Kosa posted below in "Scary Recycling Stuff," Recycling on our campus is indeed in need of serious help, and our groups original aim was to promote student recycling and increase the volume of recycling on campus.

Early in the semester, I met with Bruce Steele and Michael Stephens from facilities to learn about how recycling works here at Oxy. Mr. Steele and Mr. Stephens were very helpful and informative, but what I learned about recycling on campus was actually rather disturbing. Because we have two separate recycling companies for paper and for mixed recyclables, they MUST be separated or much of the recyclables end up in the landfill. After our grip audited the recycling situation on campus, surveying the recycling bins, we've realized that the vague signage makes recycling very unclear to students. Further, after contacting our main recycling company, SoCal Recycling, we learned that they ONLY accept CRV recyclables, which is essentially limited to beverage containers (meaning no takeout containers from the marketplace are ever recycled by Oxy!), and further, they accept nothing with any contamination. Due to the lack of communication between Oxy recyclers and SoCal recycling, the recycling company is slowly turning into our trash pickup company, as most of what they receive from us they are unable to recycle.

Part of our solution that we have enacted is to make a system of signs and labels for our recycling bins, showing students what belongs in the bins and what they have to put elsewhere (aka the garbage). While this will undoubtedly help the volume of recyclables that SoCal recycling receives, it is still a system that sends a large amount of recyclable goods to the landfills (plastic food containers, plastic packaging, bags, etc.) Thus, we are now moving towards the adoption of a new recycling system/company at Occidental, one that accepts all recyclable goods, similar to the city of LA's system.

This task is much bigger than we initially thought with our simple recycling education campaign. However, Occidental is so far behind the times with recycling, that this is no longer an issue that can simply be shrugged off. That being said, this issue is much larger than 5 UEP 246 students can handle on their own. While we are currently awaiting a response from Bruce Steele and Michael Stephens about adopting a new recycling company, we need as much support as possible. Please, continue to recycle any and every glass, aluminum, and plastic bottles/cans, recycle paper only in the paper recycling bins, and spread the word to everyone about the recycling situation that's occurring on our campus!