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Denver Elementary School Cuts Landfill Waste

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Apr 22, 2009 8:34 pm US/Mountain

Denver Elementary School Cuts Landfill Waste

Plastic Cafeteria Trays At A Denver School Actually Help Environment

Written by Environmental Specialist Paul Day
Reporting
Paul Day
DENVER (CBS4) ― Brown Elementary in Denver has made a small change in the school's cafeteria routine with big implications for the environment.

"We're not wasting as much as we were like last year," student Jordan Newton said.

Starting in August, reusable plastic trays replaced disposable Styrofoam trays for all students getting hot meals.

"It was astonishing," said Amy Highsmith, the teacher who leads the "Going Green" initiative at the school.

The Styrofoam trays cannot be recycled.

A careful study showed 90,000 disposable trays were going to the landfill every year from the elementary school.

"We were filling up several trash barrels per day just with trays," Highsmith said.

The significant reduction in waste is winning praise from "Green Up Our Schools," a national environmental group dedicated to promoting recycling in schools.

The change to reuseables was made knowing more water would be needed to clean the trays.

"You kind of have to assess, is it more wasteful to put 90,000 Styrofoam trays into the landfill, or is it better to use some water and reuse the same plastic trays." explained Highsmith.

The school is lucky to be equipped with a high efficiency dish washer that doesn't waste water.

A spokeswoman for Denver Public Schools says conserving water is not why disposable trays continue to be widely used in Denver Public School cafeterias. The main reason is cost savings -- disposable trays are cheap.

"There is a labor factor in there as well," wrote Joni Rix in an e-mail to CBS4.

Rix is Environmental Safety Specialist with Denver Public Schools.

"You don't need additional staff to wash trays," Rix said.

But at Brown, they've solved that problem. Student volunteers wash the trays.

The environmental awareness that comes with change is not confined to school. Some kids have taken home the lessons learned.

"Yes, my family recycles more now," student Elissa Vigil said.

(© MMIX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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