Waste Free Lunches

There are lots of enterprising companies that offer products so parents can pack a waste-free lunch for their children. Not to be a party pooper, but I see no real need for these special products. My son eats a peanut butter sandwich, some canned fruit, and some chocolate chip cookies. We just use some plain jane food storage containers and put his milk in a thermos. We include a napkin that is made from recycled paper. My son has been great remembering to not throw out his containers.

I wish more parents would use reusable containers instead of using Ziplock bags. BTW - Ziplock bags can be recycled. They are accepted (sans zipper) at facilities that accept plastic grocery bags. I can’t think of anything that a kid would normally have in his/her lunch that couldn’t go in a reusable container. Using reusable containers not only allows you to eliminate the need for disposable bags, it saves money. For example, instead of buying individual servings of applesauce, you can buy a big jar of applesauce and pour it into a reusable container. One of my goals is to start a “Waste-free Wednesday” program at our school. The lunch staff would reward students who brought a waste-free lunch by taking their picture for publication on the club’s blog.

Some schools have a Boomerang Lunch Program.  They encourage students who bring their lunch to bring all of their uneaten food and their waste home with them for disposal.  This has numerous benefits.  Parents can see what their children are or aren't eating and can adjust the lunches appropriately.  Parents will also see how much waste every lunch generates and will hopefully take the initiative to use reusable containers instead of disposable packaging.  If enough student bring a waste-free lunch, the waste volume generated in the cafeteria can be reduced dramatically.  This reduction can potentially result in the school being able to reduce the dumpster size and/or its pickup frequency.  Did you know that it costs about $15 a day for trash pickup at Woolridge?  More waste-free lunches in tandem with a vigorous recycling program can allow the school to save several hundred dollars in waste hauling fees.  So do your part and pack a waste-free lunch for your child today!

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Reducing Paper Towel Consumption

Woolridge Elementary School orders 30 cases of paper towels per month, and each case costs $16.66.  That equates to nearly $5,000 a year spent on paper towels.  That's 1,200,000 paper towels that are thrown in the trash each year!

I felt it was important to reduce the number of paper towels used at our school for a number of reasons.  First of all, it's important to conserve our trees, which are an important natural resource.  It takes a lot of energy to create paper towels, and creates a lot of pollution too.  Paper towels are a problem on the other end too as they end up in our landfills.  But another reason to reduce our paper towel consumption is to save money.  These stickers have been proven to reduce paper towel consumption by 15%.  Some schools have reported a 30% reduction in consumption.  In the case of Woolridge, a 15% reduction amounts to an annual savings of about $750!  Multiple that out across the 60+ schools in our school district, and you're talking about tens of thousands of dollars - all because of simple little sticker that reminds people that "these come from trees". 

During Earth Week, Woolridge students placed "These Come From Trees" stickers on the paper towel dispensers located in the various classrooms and bathrooms in the school.  They were generously provided to us free of charge by Pete Kazanjy.  He's a product manager/designer living in the Silicon Valley, and this is a fun side project that he hopes can do some good.  Click HERE to read about how the idea of "These Come From Trees" stickers was born.

So be on the lookout for these stickers the next time you're visiting Woolridge Elementary School.  Remember to take only what you really need.  I bet you'll find that you only really need one or two paper towels to dry your hands instead of a a big giant handful.  You'll be saving the trees as well as saving our school district some money.

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Foam Soap Dispensers Save Money and the Environment

This information is from the Issaquah School District in Washington State.

Small actions can make a big difference. By replacing liquid soap dispensers with foam soap, the Issaquah School District has managed to create less waste, save water, save time and save money for the district. Liquid dispensers and foam dispensers are the same size, but differ significantly in cost, waste generation, water use and maintenance.

ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITS

Waste Reduction
Foam soap is packaged in plastic bags, whereas liquid soap comes in plastic and cardboard. Using foam soap reduces the amount of cardboard waste created.

Water Savings
Foam soap is pre-lathered so students do not have to run water to lather up. Using foam soap reduces the amount of water used per wash.

ECONOMIC BENEFITS

Cost Savings

• Foam soap costs $.004 per wash compared to $.01 - $.014 per wash of liquid soap.


• Foam soap bags last 1,333 washes compared to 750 washes per liquid soap bag. This is due to the pre-lathered foam soap reducing the number of squirts needed per wash.


• Dispensers are given to the district free of cost for foam soap.


• Foam soap dispensers provide soap from the top, thus reducing gravity leaks.


• Less leaking means less countertop cleaning for staff, saving time and money.
  

CONCLUSION

Switching from liquid to foam soap reduces waste generation, water use, staff time and budget.

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Make Your Holiday Season Greener

Wrapping paper isn't accepted by most recycling facilities (including CVWMA) because it contaminates the recycling process. "But why?", you ask. It's because wrapping paper is not accepted by some recycled paper mills. There are a number of reasons for this. Wrapping paper is often dyed, laminated and/or contains non-paper additives such as gold and silver colored shapes, glitter, plastics, etc which cannot be recycled. Some wrapping paper is very thin and contains few good quality fibres for recycling. A lot of wrapping paper has sticky tape attached to it which makes it very difficult to recycle.

Instead of using wrapping paper this year, try something different. Create some great looks and reuse items found around your house.

Bows

Bags

Fabrics

Newspaper comics

Magazines

Decorative boxes

These scrap items can be used to make that gift even more special. Some of these items can also be reused year after year.

Make sure you recycle all of those cardboard boxes that the toys and other presents come in. The plastic bags that most toys and electronics come in can also be recycled at facilities that recycle plastic grocery bags.

And if you get a new computer, cell phone, digital camera, or other electronics, don't just throw out the old ones. Bring your old electronics to a company like Best Buy, who has a great e-cycling program.

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Dumpster Diving - The Results!

We had a great time at our first green club meeting of 2009 learning how to green our lunch. The kids learned how NOT to pack a lunch from Wendy Wasteful and how to pack a lunch from Go Green George. Then we talked about how 16 bags per day (almost 3,000 bags per year) of cafeteria trash are landfilled from our school alone! We talked about how to Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. We went outside and looked through a bag of cafeteria trash and found lots and lots of trays, some recyclables, chip bags, milk cartons and some untouched food. We talked about how we could reuse the black trays, how to get the kids to recycle better inside the lunchroom, what to do with those chip bags and if we could ever use washable trays again.

I still would like to see us try and use washable trays for one day (maybe during Earth Day). Don't you think the kids should experience a nostalgic moment like taking their tray to the window? One possibility to make this happen would be for parents volunteers to wash the trays that day.

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Green Club Morning Meeting for K - 2

Our first WES Green Club morning meeting for students K - 2 will be held on Thursday, November 19 at 8:30 in the cafeteria. Please arrive on time as the program will promptly start at 8:30. Students will go to their classrooms at the end of the program. Parents are welcome to stay as well. Please contact us at gogreenwoolridge@gmail.com if you'd like to help out.

Students will be learning about the waste generated in the cafeteria and the things we can do to reduce that amount. To help visualize how much trash students generate during lunch each day, we will "dumpster dive" and sort through some of the trash bags and see what we find. I think that what we will find will shock you. After sorting through the trash, we'll talk about the many things we can do to reduce the amount of trash we generate and increase the amount of waste that we recycle. We'll also talk about waste-free lunches and will make a fabric snack bag.

We'll summarize our results in a future post and talk about some of things we can do to reduce the amount of waste we generate.

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Open Forum: Energy Audit

One of the more ambitious activities the WES Green Club is hoping to perform is an energy audit of the school. But what is an "energy audit" and how does it work? The purpose of an energy audit is to evaluate the ways the school uses energy (lighting, computers, heating, cooling, etc) and determine how much energy is actually used. This information can then be used to come up with ideas on how to reduce energy consumption and increase energy efficiency.

We would like the student members of the Green Club to play an active role in the energy audit. With some adult supervision, the students can assist in surveying the school and record the number of light fixtures and computers in each room. Using some basic math, the students can estimate how much energy (and $$$) the school is consuming.

The group can then brain storm ideas for ways the school can reduce energy consumption. Students will use their math skills to calculate how much energy (and $$$) can be saved if the school implements any of these measures.

So that's the basic idea of what the Green Club wants to accomplish with the Energy Audit. The survey itself can likely be completed during a single day. Preparation and evaluation of the energy audit will occur on different days. We're looking for input from teachers, parents, and teacher alike to help us make this activity a success. Here are some items that we would like your input on:

• When would be the best time to perform the energy audit survey? Could it be done on a weekend? For how long could the school be made available to us?

• We will need volunteers to assist the students gather information. The students can be broken up into small groups and paired with an adult. Each group can be assigned a portion of the school. Please e-mail the Green Club and let us know if you are interested in volunteering.

• The energy audit will be even more successful if we can interview school staff members to learn about energy usage habits at the school. It might be fun to have the students conduct these interviews.

• The students can help prepare a report that summarizes the results of the energy audit, and the results will be posted on this blog. Perhaps the students can present their findings to the rest of the Green Club or even present their findings to the school board.

Feel free to leave comments and give input on these ideas by clicking on COMMENTS at the end of this post. The Green Club is really excited about performing an energy audit because of the learning experience it creates for the students and the potential it has for reducing energy consumption at Woolridge Elementary School.

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Open Forum: Reduce Energy Consumption

The purpose of this post is to be an open discussion of ideas to help reduce energy consumption at Woolridge Elementary School. I have posted some ideas and questions and would appreciate your feedback. Please click on "Comments" at the end of the post to participate.

Lighting

1. Replace incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs. Does CCPS make CFLs available to replace incandescent bulbs with CFLs as they burn out? Would it be practical to replace the bulbs more proactively?
2. Replace older fluorescent bulbs with more efficient bulbs. It appears that many of the light bulbs throughout the school are T12. Replacing these bulbs with T8 bulbs with high efficiency ballast can provide energy savings over 40%. These light bulbs also give off less heat so the HVAC system doesn't have to work as hard. Click HERE to see more detailed information. Would CCPS be willing to make the small investment to upgrade the ballasts to allow use of the more efficient T8 light bulbs?
3. Provide light switch stickers to remind people to turn the lights off when leaving the room. Studies have shown that light switch stickers can reduce energy consumption and typically have a pay back period of only a few months. Would WES or CCPS be willing to purchase light switch stickers for the classrooms and other rooms?

Computers/Electronics

1. Adjust settings on computer to power off computer monitors and hard drives.

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Woolridge Recycles in the Cafeteria

The Woolridge Elementary School Green Club recently created a recycling station in the cafeteria. We need your cooperation to make this effort be successful. Please encourage your child to recycle their juice pouches (no juice boxes, please!), aluminum cans, and #1 and #2 plastic bottles by placing them in the appropriate recycle bin.

Parents - Also consider packing your child's lunch in a reusable container. Let's try and reduce the amount of waste that we generate in our cafeteria.

Feel free to click on the Comments link below and share your ideas for other ways we can reduce waste and make the Woolridge Elementary School cafeteria more green.

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Open Forum: Reducing Paper Consumption

Teachers - I'd appreciate your feedback regarding the ways we can reduce paper consumption at Woolridge. Simply click on "COMMENTS" at the end of this post to respond to this post and provide your feedback:

1. How well does your classroom recycle paper? How well does your school recycle paper? What ideas do you have that will encourage recycling in your school/classroom?



2. Do you make 2-sided prints/copies? Would the school be willing to make 2-sided printing the default setting on their printers/copiers?



3. Would it be possible to use e-mail or the Internet to reduce/eliminate paper notices sent home with students?



4. Is the paper used at Woolridge made from recycled paper? Does the paper meet the guidelines of the Forest Stewardship Council or the Sustainable Forestry Initiative Program?



5. What ways are the school being wasteful with its paper consumption?

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I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas

Wrapping paper isn't accepted by most recycling facilities because the metalic wrapping papers can contaminate the recycling process. Instead of using wrapping paper this year, try something different. Create some great looks and reuse items found around your house.

• Bows
• Bags
• Fabrics
• Newspaper comics
• Magazines
• Decorative boxes

These scrap items can be used to make that gift even more special. Some of these items can also be reused year after year.

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Street Lamps Powered By Discarded Batteries

That battery you're throwing away may not have enough energy left to power your gadgetry, but it does have enough juice to light up a low-energy LED. That's the driving idea behind South Korean designer Sung Woo Park's conceptual Energy Seed, a stylish street lamp powered entirely by discarded batteries.

Drop a battery into one of the Energy Seed's disposal holes and it'll fall down into a tube. Several batteries can be stacked one on top of the other, daisy-chaining drained batteries into a long-lasting power supply for an LED lamp that will give pedestrians a bit of light on the sidewalk. It's a great way to re-appropriate trash that we'd otherwise consider useless.

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