Park Street

School:
Waste Audit Summary

December 11th, 2013
The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Ave
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2

1 (506) 442-9030
www.thegaiaproject.ca
contact@thegaiaproject.ca

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Park Street School: Waste Audit Summary
A summary of the results from the waste audit conducted on December 11th, 2013.

Copyright 2013 The Gaia Project. Last updated on January 15th, 2014.
Commercial reproducton of The Gaia Project materials is prohibited without prior writen permission

The Gaia Project is a charitable organizaton whose mission is to empower youth to make informed deci-
sions about energy and its impact on the environment.
We develop projects, provide professional development, technical support and ongoing project support for
teachers and students. Our projects aim to incorporate three key principles, which symbolise our focus on
realistc environmentalism.
1. Data-Informed Decisions We want students to be able to explain why, and quantfy the efect of
each decision they made along the way to their fnal soluton.
2. Economic Assessments We expect students to be able to assess the cost efectveness of their so-
lutons, and be able to optmize their projects with limited budgets.
3. Environmental Impact and Lifecycle Assessments We need students to take a holistc view to their
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use phase, and acknowledging that greenhouse gas reducton is not the only environmental issue at
stake.
For more informaton, please visit www.thegaiaproject.ca
The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Avenue
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2
Canada
1 (506) 442-9030
contact@thegaiaproject.ca


This project was supported by donatons and grants from:
The McCain Foundaton
Environment Canadas EcoActon Program
New Brunswick Department of Environment and Local Government Environmental Trust Fund
Fredericton Community Foundaton




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Wheelie BinsCaledonia Lane photo by Geof Wilson under a Creatve Commons BY-ND 2.0 Licence
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Overview
The Gaia Project and Park Street School
collaborated on a audit of the schools waste on
December 11th, 2013. Park Streets Leadership
students, along with Ms. Steeves, have been
working on frstly examining the schools waste
and subsequently looking for ways to reduce
the schools overall waste footprint.
An inital audit of the schools waste was done
on November 21st, 2012approximately one
year earlier and this audit was a follow-up.
The process and results are detailed within this
report, including a comparison of the results
from November 2012 to December 2013.





The Process
For the current waste audit, the custodial staf
collected all of the garbage at the school on
December 10th, bagged it and placed it outside
for us.
Sorting categories
We decided on 5 sortng categories:
Paper
Recyclable plastcs
Milk Cartons (including recyclable drink
containers)
Compost
Garbage
Weighing and Sorting
Afer deciding on our 5 sortng categories,
leadership students were provided with gloves,
divided into teams and provided with a kit of
supplies.
Before any bags were opened, the weight of
each bag was recorded so that the startng
amount of waste was known and could be
checked against the fnal amount.
Groups then opened the bags and sorted its
contents.
We subsequently weighed the contents of each
sortng category at the end of the audit. 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 5 sortng categories.
Results
The total weight of waste collected from 1
typical school day was approximately 35 kg.
The estmated total weight from one day in
November 2012 was 52 kg, representng a 17 kg
or 33% reducton over the year since the inital
audit. While there are many variables that
havent been controlled for, this 33% reducton
in overall waste may indeed represent a
signifcant overall reducton in waste at the
school!
December 2013: 35 kg total waste
November 2012: 52 kg total waste
17 kg, or 33% reducton when comparing
November 2012 to December 2013
You can fnd the actual weight from each
sortng category (our raw data) in Table 1 in the
Appendix. In total, on December 11th, 2013,
we sorted 22% of the total waste, or 8kg.

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The Gaia Project www.thegaiaproject.ca

The total weight of waste by category can be
seen in the pie chart below.


As a comparison, the percentage per category
from November 21st, 2012s waste audit is
included below.


Included below is a comparison graph, which
compares the percentage of total waste per
category from November 2012 to December
2013 and highlights the categories that have
increased and decreased.
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. Assuming 195
school days in a year, Park Street School
produces approximately 6,900 kg of waste
annually. These annual projectons can be
found in Table 2 in the Appendix. This is a very
rough estmate.
Assuming 409 students that regularly atend
Park Street School, each student produces
approximately 0.1 kg of waste per day, and 17
kg annually.
Summary
Through the process of measuring how much
and what type of waste Park Street School
produces, it was discovered that on December
11th, 2013:
40% of the waste could have been
recycled. This includes paper, cardboard,
milk cartons & other drink containers,
and recyclable plastc.
47% of the waste was compostable
material
13% of the waste was actual garbage that
needed to be there.
December 11, 2013
November 21, 2012

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Paper
Comparing the amount of paper in the garbage
from November 2012 (17%) to December 2013
(15%), there is only a small diference (2%
decrease).
From this waste audit comparison, we can
assume that, on average, between 15-20% of
the total waste is paper.
Recyclable Plastics
There was a 5% increase in the amount of
recyclable plastc seen in the current audit from
December 2013 (10%) as compared to
November 2012 (5%). This could be due to a
true increase, due to natural variance, or to
slight diferences in sortng technique.
It would be safe to conclude that approximately
5-10% of Park Streets waste is recyclable
plastcs.
Compost
In November 2012, compost represented 39%
of the total waste, and 47% in December 2013.
Compost likely reliably represents between 40-
50% of the schools total waste.
Since compost represents about half of the
schools total waste, it could be an area to focus
eforts on signifcantly reducing the schools
overall waste footprint.
Garbage
Between 13% (December 2013) and 22%
(November 2012) of the schools total waste is
garbage, and actually needed to go to the
landfll. If the school was to recycle, reduce and
compost, there is the potental to reduce the
schools overall annual waste from 6,900 kg to
~1,200 kg. This would mean that per student,
each student would only generate 3kg of waste
at the school annually, compared to the ~17kg
produced annually today.
Summary
The Gaia Project was very impressed with the
sustainability initatves under way at Park
Street School, and is excited to see that waste
at the school has potentally decreased by 17%.
Congratulatons on a job well done, Park Street
School! You defnitely got green!
Contact Us
The Gaia Project is very interested in supportng
waste reducton and other energy-related
initatves at Park Street School in any that we
can. The students, staf and administraton at
Park Street School are leaders, and I look
forward to discussing this report with the
school soon!



Vanessa Paesani, Executve Director
vanessa.paesani@thegaiaproject.ca
www.thegaiaproject.ca
1 (506) 442-9030

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The Gaia Project www.thegaiaproject.ca
Table 1. Weight (kg) per sortng categoryrepresents 22% of total waste from day
Table 2. Estmated annual weight (kg) per sortng class
Appendix
Group Paper (kg)
Recyclable
Plastc (kg)
Milk Cartons
(kg)
Compost
(kg)
Garbage (kg)
Total
(kg)
1 0.7 0.7 0.8 2.6 0.3 5.0
2 0.6 0.1 0.4 1.2 0.8 3.0
Total 1.2 0.8 1.2 3.8 1.0 8.1
Sortng Class
Weight of Waste
Examined (kg)
Total Estmated
Daily Weight (kg)
Annual (kg)
Paper 1.24 5.4 1060
Recyclable Plastc 0.78 3.4 670
Milk Cartons 1.19 5.2 1020
Compost 3.82 16.8 3270
Garbage 1.03 4.5 880
Total 8.1 35.3 6900