How Green Can Fairbanks Be?
Reducing, Reusing, and Recycling Waste - One Tin Can at a Time.
The Oberlin College Recycling Program's website states that, "In a lifetime, the average American will throw away 600 times his/her adult weight in garbage. If you add it up, this means that a 150-lb. adult will leave a legacy of 90,000 lbs of trash for his/her children." That is a scary fact.
Waste is becoming prevalent in many areas of the Fairbanks North Star Borough’s community. Local residents should be reducing, reusing, and recycling their garbage in efforts to prevent waste. Recycling sites need to be available in a variety of accessible areas, such as transfer sites; however, local transfer sites are not offering enough recycling options for patrons. Although the city of Fairbanks has a current recycling program, local dump sites should have more visible, dedicated recycling areas because it would prevent the waste of recyclable items, encourage more people to recycle, and aid in local recycling awareness.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough has a total of 14 transfer sites. These dump sites are made available for borough residents to dump their garbage and other reusable items. Each location has a general area for reusable items. On the FNSB Solid Waste Division website: Brush, Metal, Batteries, Used Oil, Aluminum, and Propane are the items they offer for disposal and recycling. According to ILACSD.org, the following items should be recycled: aluminum cans, steel cans, corrugated cardboard, white office paper, mixed paper, glass, newspaper, plastic, appliances/electronics, motor oil, and miscellaneous items such as tires.
Alaska landfills are becoming full of reusable items. Fairbanks area residents are missing a great opportunity. By not having enough recycling options at local dump sites, a mountainous amount of waste is being produced. Each reuse area should offer options to recycle every item on the ILACSD.org’s list. If borough residents are offered more recycling choices at each transfer site, less waste will be produced, and more items will be recycled. None of the FNSB transfer sites offer containers for paper, newspaper, plastic, cardboard, or glass. All are highly used items amongst all borough residents. By offering a few additional bins, the borough would be preventing a tremendous amount of waste, and possibly creating a few jobs in the process.
The Fairbanks North Star Borough community should invest in heavy duty, outdoor multi-sort recycling containers. These containers should be placed at each transfer site, and be emptied as much as needed to allow for more recyclables. After close observation, maintenance workers can decide how often the containers should be emptied. Some sites may require more attention than others. This would all depend on local traffic in an out of the transfer site. In every recyclable area, there should be a sign posted with a customer service contact number. This will give residents an opportunity to let waste services know if the area needs attention.
Many Fairbanks residents don’t know where or how to recycle. Some may know how, but going out of their way seems like more of an inconvenience. Instead of wasting everyday household items, offering additional recyclable containers at local transfer sites would encourage more people to waste less. This would also be the perfect approach to take common excuses away from the average trash dumper. With more recycling options, most typical excuses would be eliminated.
Local awareness is vital for recycling success. Additional signs and advertisements should be placed at the transfer sites, and in other busy areas around town to aid in local awareness. Advertisements should be put in local papers. This would help inform borough residents of the newly available recycling containers. Educating the public of the importance of recycling, and the consequences of not, is vital to local awareness and waste prevention. Once this begins, routines and habits will change. Recycling will become tradition amongst most families. Children will witness their caregiver’s recycling acts. In some families, younger members will even have the opportunity to aid in the recycling process, which will change the way of life for future generations. Recycling awareness is an important part of implementing a new recycling culture.
Just like one stop shops around the Fairbanks area, transfer sites should be a one stop shop for waste management. How can we expect people to start recycling, while the current system is not practical enough? Fairbanks area residents should not have to travel to 10 different locations just to recycle their garbage. It shouldn't be so difficult to go green.
Local transfer sites must meet the new demands of our world, and become more Eco-friendly. Once the option to recycle is available for all items, residents will be more likely to utilize the newly available options. Active recycling may not take off right away, but eventually local awareness will spread, and recycling will become a way of life for all borough residents. Fairbanks can feel confident that it’s doing its part in helping the environment, preventing waste, and starting a culture of waste prevention.
"Recycling Facts." Oberlin College Recycling Program. 30 Mar. 2009
http://www.oberlin.edu/recycle/facts.html
“Recyclable Items.” ILACSD.ORG. 30 Mar. 2009 http://ilacsd.org/recycle/r_items.php
“Transfer Sites Recycling/Disposal Opportunities.” Fairbanks North Star Borough. 30 Mar. 2009 http://co.fairbanks.ak.us/SolidWaste/Default.htm
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