Portland Community College
OP-17: Waste Reduction

The 2013 Portland Community College Climate Action Plan serves as the main guiding document for achieving our waste reduction, recycling and composting goals. Below is directly from the Scope IIIb PSC Sub-Committee section : 2030 Objective: Reduce solid waste generated by 50 % by improving recycling, reusing & composting. 2016 Action Items: -Continue pre-consumer composting at all campuses and expand post-consumer composting at all campuses; Increase the recycling and composting awareness campaign and outreach efforts at all campuses in coordination with ASPCC; Develop and implement a campaign to reduce demand for paper consumption; Develop methods to track and reduce the amount of waste produced in Dining Services; back of house and its current landfill-bound waste that is transported to landfill; Increase recovery rate of waste materials by a minimum of 50% from the baseline year (2006) of 7.45%. By 2030, the Scope IIIb sub-committee is charged with accomplishing a minimum district diversion rate of 75%; and Reduce demand and need for waste disposal by decreasing per capita (FTE) waste generation from the baseline year by 25%. Additionally, the Bond program is devoted to diverting construction waste from the landfill at a rate upwards of 80%. KPI 1: PCC District Diversion Rate: total weight of material collected and serviced by our commercial haulers and service contractors (collected monthly and reported by the Sustainability Analyst) KPI 2: PCC District Material Generation: total material collected and serviced by haulers and service contractors (data collected monthly) KPI 3: Materials recycled and/or repurposed and total materials sent to landfill during Bond construction. Additionally, high speed hand dryers were installed District-wide to reduce the amount of paper waste generated by the use of paper towels used for hand drying. We have not engaged the heat element in the units to avoid Green House Gas (GHG) emissions across the District by approximately 0.026 tons of CO2E per day or 6.98 tons of CO2E per year (based on a 265 day year). Approximately $1,856 in savings is realized from electricity avoidance (with the heat element off) along with battery avoidance (power supply for paper towel dispensers) Other benefits include: avoiding costs of $312 per day district-wide in supplying paper hand towels (not including labor) or $82,774 per year, based on 265 working days a year; approximately 50 tons of paper towels being diverted from landfills at an average savings of $97 per ton or $4,850 per year based on paper towels being dry or $9,700 per year based on paper towels being wet and weighing approximately twice as much; cleaner restrooms; fewer plastic garbage bag liners being used; and allowing Facilities Management Services custodians to focus on higher priority service needs of the college.