Waste Management and Recycling

Penn Waste & Recycling Posters!

Solid Waste Recycling

Daily Pennsylvanian

Penn's municipal solid waste recycling efforts collect bottles, cans, plastics, and paper from 45 locations across campus. In 2007, Penn diverted over 1600 tons of recovered materials from landfills – about 20 percent of the total campus waste including an average of 400 pounds of "no value" mail each month.

To learn about what Penn recycles, click here.

Last year, for the first time Penn participated in RecycleMania, a friendly competition among colleges and universities nationwide to see which institution can collect the largest amount of recyclables per capita, the largest amount of total recyclables, the least amount of trash per capita, or have the highest recycling rate. Penn competed in the Per Capita Classic, which measures the amount of recyclables per person and reported its total campus statistics, which includes all waste and recycling collected from all campus buildings. RecycleMania@Penn sponsored a number of events and helped focus campus wide attention around the issue of recycling.

Universal Waste Recycling

Computer and Electronic Equipment
Information Systems and Computing (ISC) is working on GreenIT Initiatives including recycling used computers (as well monitoring computer energy use). To learn more about how to disposes computers, click here.

Environmental Health and Radiation Safety (EHRS) provides awareness initiatives about electronic equipment that may contain heavy metals and other materials that can be hazardous to human health and the environment.

CFL & Batteries
Batteries and CFLs are both products that are considered hazardous or universal waste. These types of products require special disposal and recycling procedures to ensure that their contents and ingredients do not harm the environment. Like other fluorescent lights, CFLs contain a small amount of mercury that is needed to make them energy-efficient. While the amount of mercury in CFLs is very small (about 5 mg), it is still considered hazardous waste and should be handled with care.

College House residents and staff can recycle their CFLs and batteries by placing them into specially-labeled white buckets located at each College House information desk.

Waste Reduction

The Penn Bookstore sells reusable tote bags to cut down on the use of disposable plastic bags. All 15,000 copies of Penn’s 2007-2008 faculty and staff directory were printed on 100 percent post-consumer waste stock, using biodegradable soy based inks and old copies are being recycled.

Penn Dining also sells reusable tote bags as well as reusable water bottles in the retail dining locations. Penn Dining has gone Tray Free in the residential dining halls in order to reduce food waste and the associated environmental footprint, conserve energy by eliminating the need to heat water for trays, conserve water by eliminating the need to wash trays, and reduce chemical usage (detergents, rinse & drying agents) for washing trays. Other wastemanagement initiatives at Penn’s dining facilities include eliminating the use of plastic bags for to-go meals, introducing compostable takeout containers, and recycling used cooking oil.

Building Material

Working with a local construction waste management company, Penn salvages valuable materials from construction project sites, including carpet scraps, metals, ceiling tile, and drywall. When demolition of older buildings is necessary, deconstruction procedures salvage light fixtures, railings, carved stone, and windows for reuse on campus or sale.

Composting

Urban Composting
100 percent of the leaves from Penn are composted on campus – over 650 cu yards annually – and used in university gardens, planting beds, and fields, saving both the cost and energy to dispose of the leaves and to bring compost to Penn.

Farm Waste
The New Bolton Center’s large animal veterinary campus recycles 100 percent of its farm waste.