By: Saadia Shahid
On Feb. 27, the McMaster Students Union promoted its three-day education campaign “Compost at Mac” which highlighted several composting bins around campus. The campaign encouraged students to locate areas within the university where compost bins should be placed.
This was done in efforts to reduce the waste produced by students and also to promote composting.
Another table that I came across in the McMaster University Students Centre asked students to make pledges to limit their use of disposable items. I pledged to limit my use of plastic cutlery, but how feasible is that really?
As a student, making sustainable choices is difficult when there are plastic straws and cutlery distributed all over campus. It is hard to make the environmentally-conscious choice when those items are so easily accessible.
It is easy for the MSU to put up boards encouraging students to help combat climate change, but would it not make more sense for McMaster Hospitality Services to abolish the use of plastic cutlery and disposable items altogether? This would probably help reduce the carbon footprint of the entire university.
This may seem like a drastic change, but the ease lies in switching to more environmentally-friendly and sustainable options like steel cutlery and straws. Reusable mesh grocery bags should be also sold on campus to make it easier for students to adopt sustainable habits.
In making these changes, the MUSC eating area could be also revamped into a proper food court with steel cutlery and plates given out in La Piazza. Students can then return to these items to workers stationed at the food court.
A system like this is already implemented at plenty of malls with food courts and helps to reduce waste due to the availability of reusable cutlery. The cost may seem a little high, but it is not higher than the one we will have to pay due to the effects of climate change.
This initiative can start during Welcome Week with new students introduced to the green changes.
Speaking from a student’s point of view, these changes would make things easier for us and also be more beneficial for the Earth. An institution equipped with the funding makes a bigger difference than opposed to individual students struggling to find sustainable alternatives.
The MSU has done a lot of things that students didn’t vote for, such as starting the composting initiative. They encourage us to follow along as it is a change for the better, but they must at least make it easier for students to adopt.
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I live in a twelve-bedroom student house. In a single week, we have, at minimum, between two and three large bags of garbage. So far, the city has taken our bags, but this will soon change once we run out of trash tags. While my crowded housing situation might be unique, many other students are in a similarly tight position in regards to Hamilton’s garbage and recycling policy.
Since 2010, Hamilton has had a one-bag per limit policy for homeowners. This means that the city will collect only one bag of trash during the weekly curbside collection, with no limits placed on the amount of recycling collected.
The policy was created to improve the city’s waste diversion efforts, with a goal to divert 65 per cent of residential garbage away from landfills by 2021. With the city’s waste diversion rate currently standing in the mid-40 per cent, it is evident that there is still much work to be done.
The policy has undergone several revisions since its initial implementation but has stayed firm in its one-bag limit. The most important revision has been the increase in available trash tags. If more than one garbage bag needs to be picked up for the week, the additional bags require trash tags.
Each household receives 12 trash tags and can request once per year, with no fee, up to 14 more. Once requested, no more trash tags can be ordered until the following year.
This translates to 26 additional bags of trash that can be collected per year. While this seems like a lot, that is not enough to sustain a house that produces at least two bags of trash per week for a year. Untagged bags of trash are not collected, so where does this excess trash go?
The city’s recommendation is that excess waste is dropped off at the nearest community recycling centre, with an associated fee. Unfortunately, many students lack the time, resources and finances to utilize these centres. What typically results then is either illegal dumping or the storing of excess waste somewhere in the household, with hopes that it will be collected during the next collection period.
Both alternatives have their consequences. Illegal dumping often counteracts any environmental benefits that a one-bag limit creates. While storing excess waste in one’s house can temporarily solve the issue, this can lead to a build-up of trash that has the potential to cause a number of health and safety concerns.
It is not feasible for large student households to greatly reduce their total waste to meet a one-bag limit. There ought to then be a balance between reaching the city’s waste-reduction goals and forcing students to look for alternative, costly means to dispose of their waste. Until changes are made, these issues will continue to plague the city.
A complete elimination of the one-bag limit is not necessary; what should be developed is a special consideration for student households. A special consideration policy has already been developed for certain individuals that are likely to have more than one garbage bag every week.
Households that involve people with medical circumstances, families with two or more children under the age of four, registered home day cares, or agricultural businesses can apply for special consideration. Upon approval, these households are given extra trash tags that can be used on a need-be basis. By listing student households as one of the accepted special consideration cases, this can allow large student households to request additional support from the city as needed.
While obviously the one-bag trash limit was founded with good intentions, it is ultimately an unrealistic policy for every student house to abide by. With the appropriate change, however, the city can continue to strive towards its environmental goals while accommodating its large student population.
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By: Devra Charney
Dear City of Hamilton Garbage and Recycling Day,
You know that I love you. Love waking up for you every Monday at 6:59 a.m. Love not seeing my garbage collected until three hours later. Love it when sometimes my flyers from last week end up scattered on my front lawn. But there are a few concerns I’d like to discuss. Where better to start than at the beginning: my first encounter with you, which, coincidentally, was the same morning that my housemates and I discovered our infestation of fruit flies.
We had been keeping our garbage in the mudroom, since despite your friendly online advice to put our trash out anytime after 7 p.m. the night before, we wanted to avoid raccoons knocking over the bins and tearing into the bags. Until your arrival on Monday morning, we thought that we had devised an effective strategy for avoiding garbage-related pests. Upon opening the door to the back room, though, we were greeted by a swarm of fruit flies buzzing around our lidless bins.
We hauled our green bin, recycling, and garbage bin out to the curb to make sure that we’d be on time for your 7 a.m. collection before doing damage control in the kitchen. Google searches eventually yielded a recipe that claimed we could solve our problem by placing a concoction of vinegar and dish soap in containers around the room. For the duration of our fruit fly eradication, we decided to keep our bins outside until the house was fly free.
When our garbage was finally collected mid-afternoon, our green bin had the same number of bags in it as before you came. Although your web guide promises a note providing a list of possible reasons our trash could have been skipped, no such explanation was left for our full bags of wet waste. Through the process of elimination, we learned that green bins are not collected when compostable waste is placed in non-biodegradable bags.
As it turns out, raccoons aren’t as particular about bag choices as you are because a few days later, our green bin was lying on its side with food scraps spilling out of its open lid. No trace of bags could be found amongst the blackened banana peels and crushed eggshells. We might not have had a fruit fly problem in our kitchen anymore, but the number of flies circling our green bin came close to the number caught in our vinegar and dish soap traps.
For the first time, our garden hose and shovel were put to good use. We scooped the mound of rotted food scraps into a biodegradable bag so that it would not be passed over on your next arrival and hosed down our green bin until it looked clean enough to eat out of, even for non-raccoons. Our final step was placing all of our bins safely back inside the mudroom.
You’ve thrown us a lot of curve balls, Garbage and Recycling Day, but next Monday morning, we’ll be ready for you. 6:59 a.m. can’t get here early enough.
Thank you,
Fruit Fly and Raccoon Wranglers of McMaster
