Southern

Carleton
Elementary
School: Waste
Audit Summary
October 2nd, 2013
The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Ave
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2

1 (506) 442-9030
www.thegaiaproject.ca
contact@thegaiaproject.ca
Southern Carleton Elementary School: Waste Audit Summary
A summary of the results from the waste audit conducted on October 23rd, 2013.

Copyright 2013 The Gaia Project. Last updated on October 23rd, 2013.
Commercial reproducton of The Gaia Project materials is prohibited without prior writen permission.

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the areas of energy, environment and sustainable engineering.
We develop projects, provide professional development, technical support and ongoing project support for
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For more informaton, please visit www.thegaiaproject.ca
The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Ave
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2
Canada
1 (506) 442-9030
contact@thegaiaproject.ca

The Gaia Project is supported by donatons and grants from:
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Overview
The Gaia Project collaborated with Grade 3
students at Southern Carleton Elementary
School to conduct a waste audit on October
2nd, 2013. The process, results, and
recommendatons are detailed herein.
The Process
The Gaia Project and Southern Carleton
Elementary students started of the morning
talking about energy, consumpton and the
waste hierarchyreduce, reuse and recycle
and why each of these are important, and how
they might relate to the waste audit we were
planning. We discussed what kinds of things
they would typically fnd in the classroom
garbage cans, and used this to decide on sortng
classes in which to separate the waste.
Sorting classes
We decided on 6 sortng classes:
Returnable drink containers (included
milk containers)
Recyclable plastcs
Paper and cardboard
Compostable material
Garbage
Metals
Collecting the Garbage
The custodial staf collected all of the garbage
at the school on September 30th and October
1st, bagged it and placed it outside for us. Each
bag of waste was labelled according to its
locaton at the school.
It was decided to sort each of the following
locatons for garbage collecton individually:
Kindergarten
Grade 1/2
Grade 3
Grade 4/5
Staf / Ofce
Outside
Cafeteria
To evaluate the efectveness of recycling at the
school, paper/cardboard recycling and
returnable drink containers were also collected
and weighed separately.
Students were divided into groups, and gloves
were provided to all students along with a
safety orientaton. Groups then opened the
bags and sorted its contents.
We subsequently weighed the contents of each
sortng category at the end of each sortng
session. The data from each group was entered
into an excel spreadsheet so that we could
build a picture of how much waste the school
produces in a day from each of the six sortng
classes. The results are detailed below.
Results
You can fnd the actual weight from each
sortng class (our raw data) in Table 1 in the
Appendix.
The total percentage of waste by the various
categories can be seen in the charts labelled
Graphs 1 & 2, which represent waste including
and excluding recycling.
Charts summarizing the waste audit by grade

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and locaton, along with paper recycling and
drink containers recycling are included in full
size in the appendix chart 2.
Finally, the amount of waste collected and
sorted into each category has been projected
forward to provide an estmate of the waste
produced on an annual basis. Using the
assumpton of 195 school days a year, the
annual projected amount of total waste is
9,220kg. The breakdown of waste can be found
in Table 2 in the Appendix. These are very
rough estmate of the total waste the school
produces each year.

Summary
Through the process of measuring how much
and what type of waste is produced at Southern
Carleton School it was discovered that (Graph
1):
44% of the waste was compostable
material.
38% of the waste could have been
recycled. This includes:
Paper and cardboard (14%)
Recyclable plastcs (10%)
Metals (4%)
Returnable drink containers
(including milk containers)(10%).
Only 18% of the waste was actual
garbage that needed to be there.
When including recycling in the waste audit, it
was discovered that (Graph 2):
16% of the total waste was being
recycled. This includes:
Paper and cardboard (13%)
Recycled drink containers (3%)
It is estmated that each year Southern Carleton
diverts 1,500kg of waste, or 16% of the total
waste out of the regular garbage, through its
recycling programs for paper, cardboard and
drink containers. Southern Carleton should be
congratulated on a job well done.
If we found ways to divert all of the recyclable/
returnable/compostable materials, Southern
Carleton School could reduce their waste by an
additonal 6,300kg. This would reduce the total
amount of waste produced at the school to less
than 1,400kg, or by 85%.

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Paper and Cardboard
Paper and cardboard recycling is already in
place at the school. 52% of the paper and
cardboard collected during the sample period
was diverted for recycling, with the remaining
48% fnding its way into the waste stream. The
percent of paper waste and recycled paper can
be seen in Graph 3.
The overwhelming majority of the paper found
in the waste stream was from the staf and
ofce areas of the school. These areas
accounted for almost 2/3 of the paper and
cardboard that was not recycled. If the staf
room improved their recycling, they could
remove an estmated 680kg of paper every
school year or 12% of the schools waste.
As highlighted in the graphs in the Appendix, it
was observed that the amount of paper in the
garbage bins decreased from 20% in
Kindergarten to 3% in Grade 4/5. This suggests
that as students become more familiarized
with the paper recycling program, the amount
of paper entering the waste stream decrease.
It was also noted that the amount of paper in
the waste decreases with the increasing grade
level.


Returnable Drink Containers
Currently, only 27% of drink containers are
being collected and recycled / returned for a
refund, as seen in Graph 4.
This category include milk containers, for which
no recycling program currently exists, so the
number maybe lower than expected. This
category does remain a signifcant opportunity
for improvement as an estmated 800kg of
waste could be diverted from landfll.
Compostable Material
Forty-four percent (44%) of the waste sorted
was compostable material, comprising the
largest category of waste produced at the
school (Graph 1). A large porton of this
compostable material was food waste
produced in the school, by students and staf.
The cafeteria represented the single largest
source of compost within the school, although
the Grade 1-5 classrooms also represented a
signifcant porton
Recyclable Plastics
Ten percent (10%) of the waste examined was
recyclable plastc. No facilites for recycling this
material currently exist at the school.
The majority of this recyclable plastc came
from the cafeteria and staf / ofce areas of the

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school- addressing just these two areas would
target over 50% of the recyclable plastcs in the
school.
Metals
Only 4% of the waste was metal, such as food
cans with the majority coming from the
Cafeteria, and the Grade 1/2 classrooms.
Classroom-based metals are most likely a rare
event representng a single large item.
Garbage
Only 18% of the waste we examined actually
needed to go into the garbage. The area of the
school with the largest percentage of waste was
the outside garbage cans, in which a signifcant
number of food wrappers could be found (40%
of weight).
Action Plan
Students worked in groups to come up with a
number of ideas to implement at Southern
Carleton Elementary School. A summary of
these are listed below, along with the
challenges and strategy for proceeding.
Composting
Since compost represented 44% of the waste
collected, this an obvious priority area.
However, with the new school opening in 2014,
it was proposed to wait to have a compostng
system implemented at the new school.
Students could brainstorm on how this would
be operated at the new school and what sort of
educaton program would be required to
maintain it.

Paper Recycling: Staff / Office
Areas
Results indicated that stafrooms are not
recycling paper and cardboard with the same
efectveness as students areas. Inital steps to
increase the rate of paper recycling in the
stafrooms could involve surveying teachers
and staf to determine the barriers to recycling
in these areas and come up with solutons to
addressing them.
Students also suggested weekly monitoring of
recycling bins in these areas to ensure future
compliance.
Paper Recycling: Improving
Recycling Containers
While it may not be practcal at this tme to
implement paper recycling, with the school
closing at the end of this year, efort should be
taken to decrease the 14% of recyclable paper
found in the garbage. It was noted that paper
recycling containers are not the same in every
classrooms (these can be as simple as a
cardboard box). Several students suggested the
idea of decoratng the recycling containers in
order to draw more atenton to them, with the
goal of seeing increased usage.
Waste Bins: Ratios and Locations
It was noted that multple garbage cans exist in
certain classrooms. Improving the rato of
recycling containers to garbage cans could help.
When paired with an awareness campaign led
by students, this increased recycling bin rato
could help reduce the amount of waste sent to
landfll.
Accessibility of recycling containers and
garbage cans can play a large role in
encouraging behaviour change. Simply by
placing recycling containers in easier to access

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areas, and marginally increasing the efort to
use a garbage can (placing a cover, or smaller
hole on top of the can), can have signifcant
impacts in divertng waste to the correct sortng
container.
Recycling bins for plastc would represent
removal of 10% or 740kg estmated annually,
while this represents a signifcant porton of
waste. Due to the cost to run these types of
programs it maybe something to investgate
once the new school is open.
Assemblies / Announcements
Students proposed that it would be worthwhile
to share the results of this audit with the rest of
the school. An efectve way to do this would be
during the schools weekly assemblies or
through weekly announcements and reminders.
One Bag Challenge
A fnal idea was based around the concept of a
One Bag Challenge. The goal of this challenge
would be to reduce the total waste that the
school produces in one day to a single bag. The
one-bag challenge allows the students and staf
to have a strong visual target to aim for,
reinforcing the recycling behaviours they have
been learning about. This could be
accomplished by:
Establishing a single day (or week) that is
designated as the challenge day or week.
In the days or weeks preceding the event,
students can provide informaton
sessions / material to their classmates
and their parents about the challenge.
Allow students and staf to present ideas
on how to achieve the One Bag Challenge
goal.
Bringing containers to hold your
food
Only taking food to school you will
eat
The One Bag Challenge could be held in
conjuncton with a school picnic or other school
events.
Summary
Since Southern Carleton Elementary will be
merging into a new school in the fall of 2014 ,
The Gaia Project suggests that the school focus
initally on the One Bag Challenge and
improving the performance of staf / ofce
areas in the existng paper recycling to have the
biggest impact in a short tme period.
The Gaia Project is excited to collaborate and
assist South Carleton Elementary School in
achieving these goals.
Contact Us
If you would like more informaton, we would
be happy to discuss anything in this report. We
will be following up with you in the coming
weeks about moving some of these ideas
forward and it has been a pleasure working
with you.




Andrew Holloway
Technical Director

The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Ave
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2
Andrew.holloway@thegaiaproject.ca
1 (506) 442-9030

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