| Salt Lake City |
 |
 |
| GER |
12 |
16 |
7 |
35 |
 |
| USA |
10 |
13 |
11 |
34 |
|
| NOR |
11 |
7 |
6 |
24 |
|
| CAN |
6 |
3 |
8 |
17 |
|
| RUS |
6 |
6 |
4 |
16 |
|
| AUT |
2 |
4 |
10 |
16 |
|
| ITA |
4 |
4 |
4 |
12 |
|
| FRA |
4 |
5 |
2 |
11 |
|
| SUI |
3 |
2 |
6 |
11 |
|
| NED |
3 |
5 |
0 |
8 |
|
|
|
|
Games recycling exceeding expectations
By Jerry Spangler
Deseret News staff writer
Games organizers' ambitious plan to recycle or compost the estimated 3,000 tons of Olympic garbage has been plagued with minor problems, maybe even some unmet expectations.
But don't judge the plan on what was said months ago, only on the results it is delivering today, says John Madole with Green Valley Recycling, the firm that contracted with the Salt Lake Organizing Committee to do recycling and composting.
"We are at a 95 percent recovery rate," Madole said, referring to the fact 95 percent of all garbage being produced by Games visitors is now being recycled or turned into compost.
Ninety-five percent recovery is unprecedented for an event as large as the Olympics, and it has won kudos from recycling advocates who once referred to the plan as a model for controlling the types and amounts of garbage at major events.
Laynee Jones, who heads the recycling program for SLOC, said the high recovery rate can be attributed in large part to the fact that one food vendor sells at all Olympic venues, and "it is easy to control what comes into a venue and what is generated in the way of waste."
In other words, SLOC mandated the vendor use only certain types of recyclable containers.
At least that was the plan until SLOC recently lifted its ban on bringing outside food and drink into venues. "We found 20,000 people all wanting a hot dog at the same 20-minute break, it wasn't working," she said.
For the most part, Madole said, spectators' garbage has been compatible with the recyclable products. "It's had a very minor effect," he said.
While everyone is tickled with the end result of the recycling program, the success should not be attributed to the hundreds of thousands of Games visitors who, quite frankly, haven't even noticed there is a recycling program.
And they haven't bothered to separate their trash, paper into one can, plastic and aluminum into another. "It all comes in pretty much the same," Madole said, adding it was what the company expected going in.
It's not what recycling advocates and environmentalists expected. Last summer, SLOC bowed to pressure and modified its one-can-fits-all recycling plan to include a "two-bin" system whereby paper products would go into one bin, plastic and aluminum into another. Environmentalists were happy with the compromise.
But few spectators are bothering to read the fine print on the bins, scattered throughout Olympic venues, to see which garbage goes where. The result is a massive mix of waste that must be sorted.
The problem, Games visitors told the Deseret News, is the two-bin, color-coded system is poorly marked and difficult to decipher. And they don't want to spend a lot of time figuring out where to throw their garbage.
There have been other problems with the recycling program. Last summer, officials announced they would post on the Internet on a daily basis Green Valley's recovery rates so the public would know how the program was working. Those rates have never been posted, as promised.
"But we have environmental information kiosks at the venues, and we post daily recovery rates at the kiosks," Jones said.
Jones added that another problem has been not enough trash cans labeled as recycling bins.
For example, at some sites that produce a lot of garbage, like media centers, the recycling bins are tucked out of sight and out of mind, meaning everything from uneaten hot dogs to Coke cans and used paper are instead mixed together in convenient, unmarked gray trash cans that are everywhere.
Madole said the mixed waste is "not a problem whatsoever. We are at 95 percent recovery, and it can't get much more than that."
Currently, about 46.5 percent of all waste is paper, cardboard, plastic and aluminum that are bundled for recycling, while 53.5 percent is waste that is turned into compost that will be used to reseed park-and-ride lots and other areas impacted by visitors.
Gary Liss, an environmental consultant for the Atlanta-based GrassRoots Recycling Network (GRRN), said it appears that a lot of promises were made by SLOC during the months leading up to the Games, but there was not a lot of effort to make sure those promises were kept.
"The 95 percent recovery rate is great, and that is darned close to our zero-waste goal," he said. "But yes, there is a concern there was no follow-through to make sure promises were kept."
The GRRN and other advocates had worked with SLOC to develop a better recycling program than originally proposed. SLOC agreed to train staff and volunteers on recycling, and SLOC led advocates to believe the recycling program would be prominently featured to educate Games visitors.
Instead, recycling education is largely invisible unless someone actually goes looking for it.
Perhaps the biggest failing, Liss said, is that Games organizers have lost an unprecedented opportunity to teach the public about the benefits of recycling and the laudable goals of producing only waste that can be recycled or composted.
"One of the reasons we got involved (last summer) was we wanted to engage the public, to help people understand the consequences of their actions when it comes to disposing waste," he said. "We are very, very disappointed that opportunity appears to have been lost."
E-MAIL: spang@desnews.com
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February 23, 2002
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