The recycling program at Ashland University is an extensive effort to make Ashland more ecofriendly and sustainable. 

The recycling program consists of the recycling intern Cassie Nix, her student employees and a panel of staff who meet to discuss going green on campus called the Go Green Committee.

There are different aspects of the effort to go green on campus. There is the campus wide recycling program, alternate energy programs, going green education efforts and also ecofriendly alternatives being made to the Dining Services department. 

Recycling intern Cassie Nix, and Director of Buildings Services Peggy Kohler, knows the importance of the recycling program at AU.

The recycling program is the most visible to students on campus. The program works with Ashland County to recycle paper, cardboard, aluminum, metal and plastic. The program works with a company in Columbus to recycle electronic waste. 

“The county picks up cardboard three times a week for us, they pick up plastic and paper once a week,” said Nix. “Without them we wouldn’t have a recycling program. We just wouldn’t have anywhere to send it all.”

About 37.5 percent of all waste on campus is recycled.

The program makes money on some of the waste that is recycled, such as paper, cardboard, aluminum, metal and grease from Convo. But other things the recycling department must pay to have recycled.

“We have to pay to recycle old TVs and old computer monitors because they have dangerous chemicals in there,” said Nix. “So it can cost the recycling company a lot of money to dismantle and dispose of those safely.”

The most common thing recycled on campus is office paper, in which 114,765 pounds of it was recycled during the 2012-2013 fiscal year. Cardboard came in at second, and Convo waste that is sent to a pig farm came in third at 56,000 pounds. 

The total revenue from recycling last year was $8,355. That money goes back into the program providing job opportunities for students, as well as money for community outreach. 

Cassie Nix and Peggy Kohler both stress that education about going green is essential to their program’s success, as well as teaching children in the community that recycling is the right thing to do.

At least once a year, the department goes to Ashland’s local schools to teach about recycling. 

“We have the structure to recycle,” said Vice President of Facilities Management & Planning Patrick Ewing, “but until it comes a conscious decision by the users and people across campus, that really determines the success of our program. That is why we put so much effort into education and promotion to help reinforce the effort.” 

Another way that AU is reducing landfill waste is with new Eco-Containers at the Eagle’s Nest. 

Director of Dining Services Fredrick Geib oversaw the implantation of the Eco-Containers at the Nest. 

“I saw other colleges utilizing the container with great success,” said Geib, “and wanted to bring that opportunity to our campus. I was hoping students would find value in reducing the amount of waste happening on campus.”

Geib wishes the program would have been more of a success this semester, so the decision was made to charge 25 cents for all students wanting a styrofoam container next semester, instead of using an Eco-Container.

“A growing problem at the nest is students are asked at the register “dine in or carry out” and the growing response is carry out,” said Geib. “They get their product in a foam container and then sit in the dining area and eat their food. If the food was actually going out there should not be a single container in the Eagles Nest dumpster, it would all be in the dorms.”

However, other aspects of the going green movement on campus have been more of a success. 

The Go Green Committee is focusing a lot of their efforts into sustainability. Solar panels on the library, new low-flow shower heads and data collection to see if wind power would be right for the university, are all things the committee has done and are continuing to look at. 

The solar panels on the library have been in place since 2010. They were installed as part of a larger library project. 

“Along with the solar panels,” said Ewing, “the library got a more efficient heating and cooling systems, we changed from an all electric building to a partial natural gas building. We did a bunch of things to improve the general energy efficacy of the library, and the savings from doing all that helped fund purchase of the solar panels.”

Alternate energy not only saves money, but it saves the environment from preventing CO2 emissions. 

Dr. Patricia Saunders is on the Go Green Committee, and understands how important saving CO2 emissions are.

“When we burn a gallon of gas in a car or truck,” said Saunders, “we produce 8.9 kg of CO2 emissions. So far, the library solar panels have saved 1126 gallons worth of gasoline CO2 pollution. That gas would have come from approximately 59 barrels of crude oil. So the more we diversify our energy supplies to “cleaner” sources, the less crude oil we need and the less fossil fuel we burn.”

In addition to the solar panels, the committee has placed an anemometer on top of Clayton to measure the wind to see if it would be practical to use wind power in the future.

“When people think of wind power they think of those huge turbines,” said Nix, “but the reality of wind power at Ashland would be much smaller. They would help to use less energy.”

The recycling department and the Go Green Committee are actively working hard to make Ashland greener in even the smallest of ways. 

This year LED lights lit the Christmas tree by the library, which saves energy and resources.