Environmental Group Holds Trash Audit

By: Michael Pinto, Marketing and Communications Intern

On Friday, April 20, 2012, Habitat for Humanity is holding the Shack-a-Thon at Brinser Field. The Elizabethtown College Environmental Group (ECEG) has reserved a shack for their group and will be holding a “Trash Audit.” The building begins at 1 p.m.

Melanie Sturm, president of ECEG, states that the idea behind the trash audit is to show students that many of the items that they throw into the trash can actually be repurposed instead of just thrown into a landfill. The plan is to lay out tarps in front of their shack, and then to go and collect bags of garbage from around campus. They will then divide the contents of the trash bags up into 3 different piles: landfill waste, recyclables, and compostable items.

Many people are told to recycle or do what they can for their environment, but the trash audit is hoping to show students that much of what they throw away can likely be repurposed. Sometimes a visual aid is more helpful than just saying the same thing over and over again. This activity is strictly in line with everything that ECEG does, such as creating “green” notebooks that are sold in the college bookstore and working with Terracycle, who reuse items that are not commonly recyclable such as scotch tape dispenser or Caprisun pouches.

Melanie also stated that she is very glad to be working with habitat for Humanity for this project, as she is glad to be working with another student organization on campus.