Washington University recycled 489,759 pounds of waste this spring to rank No. 21 out of 200 schools in the annual RecycleMania contest’s Gorilla category, which is based on total recycled materials collected. The 2008 RecycleMania competition began Jan. 27 and ended April 5.
WUSTL’s 489,759 total pounds was good enough to rank No. 1 in the state of Missouri and No. 9 among private colleges and universities nationwide. It also tops the 486,614 pounds the University recycled during last year’s competition.
“We’re very pleased with the progress Washington University made this year,” said Matt Malten, assistant vice chancellor for campus sustainability.
“This shows that, together, our campus community can have a tremendous impact on reducing the amount of waste we send to landfills. We hope that we can continue to improve on these efforts throughout the year and further minimize the amount of waste we generate,” Malten said.
The University also excelled in the Targeted Material —Paper category, finishing No. 30 of 163 schools with 12.87 pounds of recycled paper per person, and the Per Capita Classic — based on the amount of material recycled per person — finishing No. 49 of 180 schools with 21.45 pounds.
This year, more than 400 schools participated in the contest, the most in RecycleMania’s eight-year history and approximately twice as many as the 201 schools that participated in 2007.
RecycleMania is a 10-week competition administered by the National Recycling Coalition (NRC) that pits WUSTL against colleges and universities throughout the United States to see which campus can prevent the most materials from landing in a landfill.
For more information on the contest or to see the results, visit recyclemaniacs.org.
For information about recycling on the WUSTL campus, visit ceq.wustl.edu/recycling.htm.