Stanford University
OP-19: Waste Minimization and Diversion

Stanford's waste diversion programs started in the 1970s, and significant progress with respect to diversion has occurred since 2000. Thus, that is the baseline year used for this credit.

Plastic film, grasscycling material, brush-to-mulch program material, logs-to-chips program material, wood waste (in addition to pallets)

Stanford's most current average contamination rate for recycling is 2.87% by weight, which is higher than usual because of the recent lack of markets for plastics 3-7. This includes the contamination in mixed glass loads as reported by Stanford's glass recycler.

Constant education and color-coded signage is Stanford's first step to minimize contamination followed by various training opportunities to educate on proper sorting. PSSI, Stanford's recycling contractor, sorts plastics, metal and glass on a sortline on campus and measures the residue off the line. No recycling loads have been rejected by vendors because of contamination. Stanford's glass recycler does report the amount of trash in the load.

Stanford offers several waste trainings to faculty and staff, through both HR and wellness training programs. For instance, each winter, Stanford offers a training entitled "Best Practices in Waste Reduction." In this training, employees learn about reducing their waste impact and becoming leaders in their workplaces. This course demonstrates best practices in waste reduction through the 5R's (reduce, reuse, recycle, rot, rebuy) in order to help jumpstart improvements in employee workplaces. The training is eligible for incentives through Stanford's BeWell wellness program.

Additionally, for the last ten years during Recyclemania at Stanford, all members of the campus community are encouraged to evaluate their own waste and recycling habits. Community members can pledge to reduce their waste via the Sustainable Stanford web portal, and the Office of Sustainability and PSSI offer activities and trainings to help the community learn proper sorting techniques. Stanford also offers free tours of its on-site recycling center and off-site composting facility to the campus community. In 2015, Stanford released a promotional music video in conjunction with the Recyclemania campaign entitled "All About No Waste." The video was produced by Stanford's Office of Sustainability and features Stanford students, faculty, and staff performing an adapted version of a popular song. Below are Stanford’s overall results during the 2016 Recyclemania campaign:
1) Gorilla: 2 out of 276
2) Corrugated Cardboard: 5 out of 97
3) Food Service Organics: 6 out of 140
4) Bottles and Cans: 6 out of 81
5) Paper: 7 out of 91
6) Per Capita Recycling: 16 out of 269
7) Grand Champion: 78 out of 207
8) Waste Minimization: 111 out of 114

Stanford has also competed in the national Game Day Challenge since 2014 and works to improve its programming around ZeroWaste each year. In 2015, Stanford did the following to encourage recycling and composting at the football Game Day Challenge game vs. Arizona on October 3, 2015:
1. The Athletics Marketing and Fan Engagement team sent out emails and social media blasts and developed web content before the game.
2. 25 A-Frame signs were placed throughout the tailgating areas that had Athletics Sustainability messages on them.
3. One of the largest tailgating events was greened through the Cardinal Green Events Program.
4. Athletics and PSSI partnered to promote reusable propane cylinders in partnership with the Cities of Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale and CalRecycle through banners, bins to collect disposable propane canisters, and a table in the FanFest area.
5. Ushers were trained on the recycling program.
6. During halftime a new Athletics sustainability video was shown.
7. Cardinal Green t-shirts were used during the t-shirt toss.
8. The Sustainable Stanford Logo was kept up on the Jumbotron throughout all of halftime.
9. 25 sets of recycle/landfill event bin sets were ordered and placed in the Fan Fest Area (this is done for all games)
10. Recycling event bins were placed next to each dumpster or debris box in the tailgating areas (this is done for all games)
These activities ensured that Zero Waste messaging would reach all 39,300 attendees, including season ticket holders, members of the campus community, and members of surrounding communities. Stanford’s diversion rate at this game came out to be 6.55%, breaking down to 24 tons of landfill, 0.25 tons of cardboard recycled, and 1.44 tons of plastics, metal and glass recycled. This diversion rate is actually lower than the season-long average of 11.81%. In fact, throughout the season, Stanford sees diversion rates for each game between 6.55% and 18%, and in 2015, Stanford devoted intern resources to determining why these diversion rates fluctuate so much. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be a clear pattern other than changing audiences based on different opponents. All in all, despite Stanford’s extensive programming efforts, the university placed 56th out of 59 institutions that competed in the 2015 Game Day Challenge for overall diversion rate.
Stanford also competes in the related PAC-12 Zero Waste challenge during both the football and basketball seasons and in the Recyclemania Game Day Challenge during basketball season. For the 2016 basketball season, Stanford selected one men’s basketball game on February 11, 2016 and one women’s basketball game on February 26, 2015 to host the Game Day Challenge. Both events included the following programming:
1) Stanford Athletics sustainability initiatives were featured in the Stanford Report, Stanford’s news outlet, via an interview with Stanford Athletics Director Bernard Muir (https://news.stanford.edu/2016/02/10/green-athletics-muir-021016/).
2) Athletics sent bi-weekly emails to our season ticket holders leading up to the game to prepare them for the Zero Waste Challenge.
3) Athletics sent emails to students prior to the game to target their engagement in the event.
4) Stanford Athletics social media shared sustainability posts about the game on its page
5) Throughout the game, the big screen displayed 15 facts about sustainability.
6) The game announcer made four different announcements encouraging people to sort their waste
7) Before the game, sustainability representatives gave extra training for concessions staff regarding sorting of materials and locations of recycling and compost bins and made sure composting bins were available within concessions booths for food waste that could not be donated at the end of the game.
8) Office of Sustainability created pocket guides for red coats (ushers) and gave a training on all of the items at the games that were recyclable and compostable so that they could assist fans with sorting
9) The Office of Sustainability played their Recyclemania Video “All About No Waste at Stanford”, a musical parody based on Meghan Trainor’s “All About that Bass” during halftime. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKo0XXiWGVM.
10) The on-court host wore a Cardinal Green t-shirt supporting sustainability throughout the game
11) The concourse featured 10 A-frame signs with factoids related to sustainability in Athletics on both sides were placed around the concourse to help fans learn about what the Athletics department is already doing to be more sustainable and encourage them to do their part.
12) Office of Sustainability recruited and trained campus community members to staff bins during the game to engage fans and assist them with the recycling/composting sorting process.
13) We placed a separate bin at the facility that allowed fans to bring their old athletic shoes for recycling.
14) Since the game was during Greek Week, Athletics encouraged students to bring their fraternities and sororities to the game to compete.
15) Students held up hand-made signs with funny messages about recycling for display in the student section and on the fan cam
16) On the Concourse, fans could make posters out of recycled materials and get RecycleMania tattoos.
For these games, PSSI made a concerted effort to add composting bins throughout the stadium, making sure that all landfill bins were paired with one recycling event bin and one compost event bin. With this additional infrastructure and the programming listed above, Stanford was able to achieve a 28.57% diversion rate at the men’s basketball game and a 17.65% diversion rate at the women’s basketball game. This breaks down to 800 lbs of landfill, 80 lbs of compost, 140 lbs of cardboard, and 100 lbs of plastics, metal and glass at the men’s basketball game and 1,680 lbs of trash, 140 lbs of compost, 60 lbs of cardboard, and 160 lbs of plastics, metals, and glass at the women’s basketball game. Stanford also placed 15th out of 24 schools who competed in the national Recyclemania Game Day Challenge in the Waste Generation category; 18th out of 26 in the Per Capita category; 15th out of 18 in the Food organics category; and 23rd out of 24 in the Diversion Rate category. The addition of composting in this case seemed to be a leading cause for increased diversion rates and has spurred significant interest in adding permanent compost infrastructure inside and outside Athletics venues.

Stanford has completed 28 waste audits over the last 6 years. Each year, landfill dumpsters from an assortment of buildings are selected and a team of volunteers sorts the material into 12 categories. Key findings include that over 25% of the waste sent to landfill is recyclable and 39% of the waste sent to landfill is compostable. The waste audits help the university determine next steps in its Zero Waste Program.

Wherever possible, Stanford strives to minimize waste through its purchases. Minimization of packaging is a central aspect of the sustainable purchasing guidelines used on campus. For more details, please visit:
http://www.stanford.edu/group/fms/fingate/staff/buypaying/policy_notes/sustainable_purchase.html

Additionally, Stanford includes language in most cafe contracts stipulating that compostable materials must be used. In any contracts that do not currently include such language, Stanford will include it when the contract is up for renewal.

Stanford has a Surplus Property Sales department which houses surplus university assets and resells them to university affiliates or any members of the surrounding community. Items sold through surplus property include machinery, electronics, furniture, and office supplies. Stanford also has a furniture reutilization program that ensures excess furniture does not end up in the landfill. A REUSE website maintained by Surplus Property Sales enables Stanford departments to transfer materials between each other.

The Cardinal Green Lab Program, in partnership with Property Management, EH&S, and PSSI, hosted a laboratory sharing event on March 17, 2016 to help labs donate good-quality, usable items to other labs in need. Over 100 labs participated, resulting in at least $50,000 in research funding saved, and a significant amount of waste diverted from the landfill.

The Stanford Free Store is a student-run initiative that collects free goods, such as books, clothes, shoes, school supplies, household items, and more. Stanford community members can donate to the store or take needed items - all for free! More information available at http://stanfordfreestore.weebly.com/about.html.

Also, SU Post is an online marketplace for students on campus to post and exchange goods. Students for a Sustainable Stanford is also developing an initiative to collect goods during student move and give them to low-income students the following year. The Give & Go move out campaign also addresses the reuse of student items that might otherwise be put in the landfill. The campaign has been running for several years and continues to improve each year. In 2016, student interns led an initiative for students in one particular area to bring their items to a central location, staffed by a Goodwill representative, one week early in order to avoid the chaos of move-out day and encourage increased reuse of goods.

On the employee side, the Stanford Staffers group, of which all Stanford staff members are eligible to be a part, often has postings of unneeded goods on its listserv, which allows the group to act as a staff exchange program.

All students must pay a printing fee of $0.10 per page to release a job on any Stanford-owned printer.

Stanford switched its course bulletin to an online-only format in order to save paper and other resources. Students can view transcripts, course schedules, course directories, grades, and many other academic resources online through Axess, Stanford’s web-based record management system. None of these materials are printed except by individual request.

Stanford established and launched a formal “Give & Go” campaign to reduce waste in residence halls during the annual move-out period (https://rde.stanford.edu/studenthousing/give-go-donation-program). In addition, Student Housing maintains a comprehensive website resource for move-out, with details about all the materials collected and the corresponding collection points on campus.

Stanford's Deskside Recycling and Mini Trash Bin Program is the newest paper waste collection system based on the concept of minimizing waste and maximizing recycling. It consists of two bins, one 14-quart blue recycling bin and one 1.15-gallon mini black trash bin that hangs on the side of the recycling bin. In addition to making it easier for building occupants to recycle their paper waste, this program also encourages minimization of landfill materials due to the small size of the deskside mini trash bin. Custodians are responsible for emptying both the recycling and trash bins on a weekly schedule. To date, over 7,500 sets of bins have been placed in 82 buildings on campus.

Student residences are also gradually being moved over to a three-bin waste system to make it easier to sort materials inside rooms. This project will be fully complete within the next 5 years. In the meantime, catchy labels are being distributed to students with the existing bins that will help them better understand how to sort their waste when they take it out to the dumpsters.

Additionally, Stanford has recently expanded its composting program, since waste audits have shown that organic waste comprises 39% of material sent to the landfill. For instance, Student Housing has expanded its paper towel composting program and has formal plans to make some of its residences Zero Waste. This program was rolled out in 2015 and began with several of the high-profile row houses. Also in 2015, Stanford launched an interior composting program for the first time, where Stanford's waste management contractor will set up and service compost bins inside academic buildings at a minor cost to each department. As of May 2016, 70 buildings are participating in this program, and the waste composted through this program increased from 1,140 pounds in July 2015 to 2,560 pounds in November 2015. The university also operates a voluntary composting program and continues to strategically add shared compost dumpsters across campus to make it easier for building occupants to discard organic waste from the small compost bins that they individually maintain.

Stanford also offers several waste minimization and diversion trainings for staff and faculty.

Stanford also continues its endeavors to make sure all recycling and composting bins in academic buildings are labeled uniformly. Stanford has re-labeled over half the bins on campus and will steadily continue to re-label the remaining bins. These labels clearly show what types of products should be put in which bins, and their consistency across campus will translate to higher levels of recognition among individuals and, in turn, improved individual recycling habits.

For more information, please visit the following websites:
http://bgm.stanford.edu/home_pssi_main
http://sustainable.stanford.edu/waste
http://sustainable.stanford.edu/be_cardinal_green_recyclemania