SOLUTIONS
She has a bachelor’s degree in environmental sciences from UC Berkeley, but Ellyn Hae admits it: she’s basically a dumpster diver. And she just set her own personal record: single-handedly picking through 283 dumpsters, from 3-cubic-yard cans to 40-cubic-yard monsters, in three months. All were part of her largest-ever contract: to tell Los Angeles International Airport how it can break its 50,000-ton-a-year garbage-production habit.
“They didn’t even know how many dumpsters they had,” says the founder of Recycling by Nature. “They thought about 50. It turned out I dove into 283.”
What were the biggest sources of waste?
“Plastic champagne glasses--and pillowcases. A scary amount of pillowcases. Ten percent of the total volume was pillowcases from the airplanes. Most of them are OK,” she adds. “They’re just white fiber-based pillowcases. You can recycle them. But 10% are either colored fiber or polyester-based. We want the airlines to change to recyclable ones.”
She reckons LAX can recover and recycle 50% of its current landfill-bound waste. And with “source reduction,” such as using real glasses or easily recyclable plastic cups, another 5% of garbage generated could be saved from landfills.
Hae recognizes that cost is paramount when persuading businesses to become more eco-efficient. “You can’t be a martinet. These are hard times. Fortunately, recycling is becoming more profitable. California has more domestic markets for recycling materials than most states, and many export markets are developing around the Pacific Rim. “
She has submitted a large report to the authorities at LAX. And she feels sort of guilty about it--production of the 300-page main report (two copies), plus the 50-page “Executive Analysis” (100 copies)--nearly 6,000 pages in all--will require the sacrifice of one complete 30-foot tree. Though, she hastens to add, the paper is recycled and recyclable, and typed on both sides. And she hopes not to see copies of it hiding among the airlines’ paper pillowcases next time she takes to dumpster-diving at LAX.
