ETSU’s recycling program goes well beyond the recycling bins that were placed across campus last fall and are now fairly well recognized – the blue wire racks for plastic and aluminum bottles and the red plastic bins for paper and cardboard.
The program also recycles scrap metal, oil, tires, batteries, ink cartridges and e-waste. And plans are underway to recycle even more, by adding new recycling bins and encouraging new ways to recycle.
During the first year of the program, the university cut the amount of its waste that ended up in a landfill by 8 percent.
Just in this past month of August, there were 28,280 pounds of trash recycled on ETSU’s campus. To put that into perspective, if the school recycled 3,000 pounds of plastic bottles in a month, which is close to its average, that would mean a total of 90,000 bottles were thrown into the recycling bins.
So, where do the collected bits and pieces of trash go?
The City of Johnson City picks up the cardboard, paper and plastic located in designated dumpsters. Ink cartridges are taken to Cartridge World located just north of the CPA. Aluminum and scrap metal are taken to Omnistore, also known as Elizabethton Herb and Metal.
Tyler Gavigan, who became ETSU’s recycling coordinator in February this year, noted that the recycling program’s goal is to increase the amount of waste diverted from landfills by another 15 percent in the 2008-09 school year to make a total of 23 percent of ETSU’s total waste being recycled in some way.
Currently, recycling bins are located in every building on campus including the VA Hospital, the Quillen College of Medicine, the Child Study Center behind Kroger, and the Gray Fossil Site.
The first bins inside residence halls are ready to be placed inside Lucille Clement Hall and will be monitored by the resident advisers, Gavigan said.
He also noted that he is attempting to help groups on campus who are sponsoring an event to keep it a “no-waste event.” Often at concerts and social gatherings all trash simply gets thrown into a single, large bin, he said, but he plans to be on hand to help take care of the recycling at these events.
Buildings or groups on campus can request recycling bins from Gavigan, and he also offers to teach ways in which people or offices can be more environmental friendly through small, easy changes in daily life such as utensil reuse and paper-saving measures.
A project in the works with the ETSU recycling program is the ordering of new, more aesthetically pleasing recycling bins to be placed in the more highly visible buildings on campus such as Burgin Dossett Hall, the VA Hhospital, the college of medicine and the college of pharmacy.
About 30 triangular-shaped recycle bins are specifically used for sporting events and sporting facilities, which are located at the Mini-Dome and the new Summers-Taylor soccer field. These were donated by Coca-Cola through the company’s new partnership agreement with ETSU that was signed this summer.
Teaming with the student group Initiative for Clean Energy (ICE), Gavigan also hope to add some vigor to the recycling effort by sponsoring recycling competitions between dormitories to increase student recycling on campus. The competition would have incentives for the dormitories.

Author