Avoiding Waste

A waste audit in 2004 of Camperdown/Darlington suggests that the University generates over 5 tonnes (or 40,000 Litres) of solid waste per day.

• New waste tender
• Materials at a glance
• E-Waste recycling
• Wood Waste recycling
• Other initiatives

As of September 2008, the University of Sydney has a new waste collection and disposal contract. While this will mean little change to the way we handle waste on site, in time all waste items (except e-waste, paper and cardboard) will be sent to a facility being built at Woodlawn, near Goulburn. Here, materials will be separated into glass, plastics, metals, and organic components, vastly reducing the amount of waste that is sent to landfill. This service covers all University facilities. The paper and cardboard recycling system and the e-waste service will remain as is – see below for more information.

Paper and cardboard

The University has a successful recycling collection for paper and cardboard on all campuses. Most large yellow and blue bins should now have the new Paper and Cardboard Recycling sticker displayed.
Download the Paper and Cardboard Recycling sticker.

If any of your bins have the old sticker, or are missing signage altogether, please , and let us know the quantities you require and your internal mailing address.

The 2003 waste audit revealed that only 16% of discarded paper was used on both sides, so please remember to duplex print and copy when possible – better still set your computer to duplex by default and you won’t have to keep changing the settings. Contact your IT helpdesk for a ‘how to’.

Toner Cartridge Recycling

Many sections of the University have been recycling their used toner cartridges through the Planet Ark ‘Close the Loop’ program. Several central drop off points on main campus are available for staff without access to a ‘Close the Loop’ box. Please take your used cartridges to your nearest building listed below and they’ll be returned to Planet Ark for remanufacturing and reuse.

The Environmental Strategies Team is looking for other offices and staff to manage similar collections. If you are interested, please , or Planet Ark (or phone 1800 24 24 73).

E-Waste
E-waste includes computers, printers, faxes, servers, audio-visual items, heaters, cooking and scientific equipment.
Find out more.

Hazardous liquids and solids
Guidelines, forms and policies for the reduction and management of Hazardous liquids and solids can be found online at OH&S and Injury Management, the group that manages the University's EPA licence.

Construction and Demolition Materials
Construction and Demolition Materials are managed by Campus Infrastructure and Services. Building waste was recycled during the Campus 2010 demolition of the Edgeworth David building, Stephen Roberts Theatre and the Tin Sheds.

Timber cutting
At the Faculty of Architecture wood shavings and kindling are recycled and reused.
Find out more.

Garden Organics Recycling
The University of Sydney’s main campus provides one of the largest green spaces in the inner city. Grounds staff from Campus Infrastructure and Services maintain the gardens and resulting garden waste on site. They recycle approximately 1800 cubic meters of green waste per year, most of this is composted and the rest is chipped through a chipper. The end product is used as a soil improver or mulch.

In addition, they also use approximately 1500 cubic meters of mulch per year, much of which is obtained for free from our tree contractor when working on site and other local contractors including Sydney City Council.

How to arrange for e-waste recycling
Electronic equipment must first be processed through the Assets Management system in Finance. Once this is complete, please or at extension 65441 to find out where to deliver items for temporary storage where they will be collected for recycling.

Costs for storage, delivery to the recyclers and recycling of the e-waste will be covered by the Sustainable Campus program.

For very large amounts of e-waste (eg. an entire computer lab being replaced), where delivery to temporary storage would be impractical, on-site collection and direct delivery to the recyclers can be arranged. This will entail a cost for courier handling. Please or at extension 65441.

PLEASE NOTE: There will be no further mid-year collections covering the whole university. Instead an on-demand service is provided throughout the year.

2007 Electronic Waste Recycling Program
The second E-Waste (Electronic Waste) Collection and Recycling Program was held in the 2007 mid-semester break. Coordinated by Campus Infrastructure Services through its Sustainable Campus program, 62 tonnes of material has been recycled since the collection was initiated in 2006.

While e-waste includes any item that was once plugged into an electric socket, the bulk of items collected were computers. In 2005 a student research project estimated that the University of Sydney owned over 20,000 desktop computers that would eventually be discarded. Computers contain heavy metals, including lead, mercury and cadmium, that are toxic to the environment. They can leach from landfills to contaminate groundwater. On the other hand, e- waste also contains heavy metals that have commercial value once recovered, such as gold and copper.

The inaugural collection in 2006 focussed only on the main Camperdown and Darlington campuses. About 20 tonnes of materials were collected. In 2007 the program was extended to other University of Sydney campuses. Over 42 tonnes was collected from 9 sites. The e-waste was stripped down to its various material components and recovered and recycled for reuse. The contractors, Sims E-Recyclers, have provided certificates of destruction for the hard-drives to ensure that any data on the computers is destroyed and un-readable. A small proportion (only 2%) ended up in landfill.

In the past, Schools and Administrative Units have purchased electronic equipment that gets stockpiled once obsolete. The University’s procurement policy now promotes the leasing of computer equipment, including a product takeback service. The more this option is taken up, the less likely such clearouts will be required in future.

Linda Feinberg, Technical Officer and Tutor in Object Design from the Faculty of Architecture has been recycling wood shavings since starting at the university - initially in the Education Faculty (mid 1990's- Grounds collected them for mulch at that stage). When she started in Architecture she continued recycling timber shavings and took them across to the Agriculture gardens and glass house opposite.

There are 5 types of wood waste generated in the lab:

1. solid timber offcuts: these are continually used and re-used (free bin), until they are very small (as they are used for models, even tiny pieces),
2. when these are even too small for students they are given away for kindling, multimedia and children's craft materials - they are often interesting shapes and wonderful timber species)
3. composite board offcuts - re-used until small and then binned,
4. solid timber shavings (5-6 large bags a semester) go to the agriculture space opposite for mulch/compost
5. composite board sawdust - is binned

A double dust extraction system separates wastes into two types - one for solid wood and the other for all wood including composite board dust. The solid wood shavings can be used for compost, horse stables etc; composites can't because they contain formaldehyde and are considered problematic wood waste. Composite board offcuts also can't be burnt due to the formaldehyde offgassing. So composites are a problem both as solid waste and dust.

Apart from energy there is no cost in recycling. Rather the opposite- a considerable amount is saved on new timber purchase, delivery, transport etc by re-using timber; Linda walks the shavings over to Agriculture; people in the Faculty collect the boxes of kindling. It is harder to find homes for the kindling so if there are other people or sections around the university wanting shavings and/or kindling they are welcome to .

CPS 'buys green' 100% post consumer recycled copy paper.
CPS has been 'buying recycled' A4 and A3 copy paper for printing and copying since 2004. This initiative saves 100 trees a year. The extra cost of the paper has been covered by setting the machines to produce double sided copies as a default option. And the children at Boundary Lane Childcare provided some artwork in thanks (see picture). We are now assisting in further promotion of recycled content paper to buildings which use a high volume of paper, such as Fisher Library.

Excess furtniture removed, recycled and reused during recent move from Griffiths Taylor.
Campus Property and Services successfully trialed a new way to contract removalist services in 2005, to require that old and unwanted furniture was disposed of as a last resort. The contract was given to Move Corp. Before the decant, staff in the building were asked to separate items they didn't want any longer. More than 98% of paper and cardboard was recycled; 60 printer cartridges were reused or recycled; 100 chairs, 10 timber bookcases, 12 tables and steel shelving was donated to The Scouts.