Recycling bin contest promotes a greener campus

A little bit of color can make IU greener, organizers of a recycling bin designing contest say.

For the second year, Volunteers in Sustainability is sponsoring the “Outdoor Recycling Bin Design Contest.” Submissions are being accepted until Jan. 31.

Junior Nathan Bower-Bir, coordinator of Volunteers for Sustainability, said he wants the contest to increase visibility and awareness of recycling.

The idea is to make the cans noticeable and fun, sophomore Jordan Jacobs said. Jacobs came up with the idea in fall 2007 and presented it to Volunteers in Sustainability.

“I think many people would say these are eye-catching,” Jacobs said. “It would be hard to confuse them with regular trash cans.”

Placing the colorful containers next to garbage cans encourages recycling instead of simply throwing bottles and cans away, said Steve Akers, an advisor for Volunteers in Sustainability and associate director for Enviromental Operations for Residential Programs and Services.

The five buckets kept on campus for the last eight months kept a total 275 gallons of glass, plastic and aluminum from entering the “waste stream” each week, Akers said.

There are detailed instructions posted on the canister about what can be recycled, he said. With this arrangement, almost no garbage ends up in the recycling bin.

There’s even talk of putting the recyclers at tailgates and Little 500, Bower-Bir said.

“We really want to work on recycling at sporting events because that’s where so much that could be recycled is not being recycled,” Bower-Bir said.

Five of the canisters from last year were still standing at high-volume locations around campus until a few days ago, Akers said. The paint will be scraped off, and the canisters will be reused.

“So we’re recycling the recycling containers,” Akers said.

Artists will use regular latex-based paint to reproduce their winning designs on the recycling bins, Akers said. The designs are then covered with a layer of polyurethane, which keeps the paint from chipping for months.

The judges will simply be looking for “something interesting,” Bower-Bir said, adding that the designs don’t have to be related to recycling. 

Though Bower-Bir said he isn’t sure who the judges will be, they will come from different departments and groups across campus.

Still, Jacobs believes there’s more that needs to be done.

“I think there’s a lot more to be done to convince the majority of Indiana University students to pursue an environmentally friendly and sustainable lifestyle,” Jacobs said.