Communities embrace living green, on and off campus

Carolina blue isn’t the only color dominating UNC’s campus. Multiple green efforts are springing up on-campus and in the Town of Chapel Hill.

Residential Green Games is a competition between all 15 on-campus housing communities — which includes all residence halls, Odum and Ram Village— that promotes sustainability education in a peer-to-peer format, said Austen Hughes, Green Games intern at the UNC Office of Waste Reduction and Recycling (OWRR).

Different programs are held to give residents an opportunity to earn points for their residence community and compete with all other communities’ on-campus.

“Sustainability and becoming more efficient and green is going to be important for having any kind of future,” Hughes said. “The hope is whatever they’re learning here they will go on and do for the rest of their lives and not just do it to earn points.”

The Sustainability Living Learning Community (LLC), which is housed in Morrison — UNC’s only green residence hall — organizes events promoting energy conservation and sustainability, said Janelle Briscoe, community director for Morrison, in an email.

172 solar thermal panels that provide hot water for showers, Energy Star equipment and occupancy sensors for the laundry rooms, low-flow shower heads and an outdoor compost bin are several of the green features offered by the dorm, she said.

The dorm also houses energy dashboard kiosks that measure the buildings electricity, steam, chilled water consumption and solar thermal (hot water) production in real time.

Another on-campus green initiative is EcoReps, a student led organization that provides peer-to-peer outreach in an effort to support UNC’s sustainable practices, programs and initiatives.

“Students can become certified EcoReps by completing a one-day training session,” according to the EcoReps website, “in which they learn what it means to sustainable at Carolina and how to educate other students on leading sustainable lives.”

Outreach opportunities provided by EcoReps include presentations and activities for student groups and residence halls, interactive educational displays, and sustainability walking tours of campus and high performance buildings.

Briscoe said the Morrison building features and other campus initiatives help students become more eco-friendly.

“Familiarity with sustainability features within Morrison and throughout campus enables students to speak intelligently about the market readiness of these programs and technologies and serve as sustainability ambassadors in their communities,” she said.

She said good footprint reducing behaviors include taking short showers, turning off the water while brushing teeth, turning off lights and equipment when not in use, and recycling paper, metals, glass, and plastic.

“We’re picking up recycling constantly on campus,” said Natalia Posthill, recycling coordinator for UNC OWRR.

Recycling carts outside residence halls and on-campus apartments are picked up several times a week — the exact day depends on the residence hall — and collection routes are designed to pick up carts when they are full, she said.

Two different streams of materials are picked up on-campus, she said.

Metal cans, aluminum, #2 and #5 plastic tubs — such as yogurt containers where the opening is the same size or wider than the base — glass bottles, newspapers, office paper and notebook paper are among items collected.

Off-campus residents can look to the Orange County Solid Waste Management Department for recycling.

The county provides all recycling services for the Town of Chapel Hill including apartment complexes, duplexes and single-family homes.

Blair Pollock, solid waste planner for the Orange County Solid Waste Management Department, said the county looks for specific recyclables depending on whether or not there’s a market for them using resin identification codes.

“Just because there’s a number inside a recycling symbol doesn’t mean it’s recyclable,” he said.

“Recycling is all about, not just putting stuff in the bins, but it has to be made into something else.”

All bottles are picked up since over 98 percent are #1 and #2 plastics. However, not all #1 plastics are recyclable.

Pollock said a TV dinner tray, which is a #1 plastic, wouldn’t be recycled because of how it’s made. The tray is injection-molded and dark colored — as opposed to being blow-molded and lighter colored.

The county picks up #2, #4, and #5 non-bottle plastics, all clean dry paper, glass bottles and jars. Glass mirrors and plastic bags are not recycled.

Number 1, 3, 6 — such as Solo cups — and 7 non-bottle plastics are not recycled because there is no market for them.

Information for what can and cannot be recycled can be found on the blue carts placed outside apartment buildings as well as on the Orange County website, Pollock said.

He also said the county is in the process of putting up signs at dumpster sites without recycling carts that guide residents to the nearest bins for all apartments that have more than one dumpster site.

“Now when you go to dump your garbage at the dumpster you’ll easily know where the nearest recycling carts are located at your complex,” he said.

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