Innovative waste management is another way that UBC is building a community at the forefront of best practices in sustainability.

Currently, UBC diverts about 44% of its operational waste away from the landfill. We reduce, reuse, recycle and responsibly manage our waste. And over the years, we’ve launched a broad range of successful waste reduction programs from greening our supply chain to promoting reusable containers and composting.

But we can do more—much more based on the results of a recent waste audit at UBC’s Vancouver campus. According to the audit, the predominant materials that UBC still sends to landfill are organics, paper and plastic. The chart below outlines the composition of UBC’s operational waste.

The University is developing a Waste Action Plan for UBC’s Vancouver campus that will help establish a vision for waste reduction and management, and the actions required to achieve this vision.

Initial Consultation

As the first step in the planning process, UBC’s Campus Sustainability office conducted a full-day workshop and open house in February 2011 to get input from the UBC community for the development of the Waste Action Plan.

Approximately 40 staff, faculty, students, residents and others participated in the sessions, providing their visions and priorities for waste management, and actions the University could take to help realize these visions.

The vast majority of participants shared a vision of achieving a zero-waste campus, with key priorities identified as: organics and composting; supply chain waste reduction; financial mechanisms; communications and branding; and integrated ownership and engagement. Detailed and lengthy lists of potential actions that UBC could take in support of each priority were developed for further exploration.

Next Steps

Input from these sessions is now being considered along with technical analysis by Working Groups of staff, faculty, students, residents and others as they develop the Waste Action Plan. The draft plan is anticipated to be complete by fall 2011.

Want More Info?

If you want to receive updates on UBC’s waste management planning process, please sign-up for the Campus & Community Planning email list at http://www.planning.ubc.ca/email_signup.php

To find out more about waste management on UBC’s Vancouver campus see the Waste Action Plan Discussion Paper.