The Gaia Project

270 Rookwood Ave

Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2

1 (506) 442-9030
www.thegaiaproject.ca
contact@thegaiaproject.ca

Hazen White
St. Francis School:
Waste Audit Summary

June 5th, 2014
s
Hazen White-St. Francis School: Waste Audit Summary
A summary of the results from the waste audit conducted on June 5th, 2014.

Copyright 2014 The Gaia Project. Last updated on June 11th, 2014.
Commercial reproducton of The Gaia Project materials is prohibited without prior writen permission.

The Gaia Project is a charitable organizaton whose mission is to empower youth to make informed deci-
sions about energy and its impact on the environment.
We develop projects, provide professional development, technical support and ongoing project support for
teachers and students. Our projects aim to incorporate three key principles, which symbolise our focus on
realistc environmentalism.
1. Data-Informed Decisions We want students to be able to explain why, and quantfy the efect of
each decision they made along the way to their fnal soluton.
2. Economic Assessments We expect students to be able to assess the cost efectveness of their so-
lutons, and be able to optmize their projects with limited budgets.
3. Environmental Impact and Lifecycle Assessments We need students to take a holistc view to their
projects. This means looking at their projects from cradle to grave, as opposed to just examining the
use phase, and acknowledging that greenhouse gas reducton is not the only environmental issue at
stake.
For more informaton, please visit www.thegaiaproject.ca / www.projetgaia.ca

The Gaia Project
270 Rookwood Avenue
Fredericton, NB
E3B 2M2
Canada
1 (506) 442-9030
contact@thegaiaproject.ca


This project was supported by donatons and grants from:
The McCain Foundaton
Environment Canadas EcoActon Program
New Brunswick Department of Environment and Local Government Environmental Trust Fund




Front Cover Credits
Wheelie BinsCaledonia Lane photo by Geof Wilson under a Creatve Commons BY-ND 2.0 Licence
The Gaia Project www.thegaiaproject.ca

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Overview
The Gaia Project and Hazen White-St. Francis
School collaborated on an audit of the schools
waste on June 5th, 2014. Ms. Connors grade 4
class and The Gaia Project staf examined the
schools waste and discussed ways to reduce
the schools overall waste footprint.
This audit can be followed up in the future by
another audit to assess how well
recommendatons and waste reducton
solutons, arising from this project, have been
implemented. This would be done by
comparing the results of this audit to the next
one, to see if the overall amount of waste per
day is reduced, and whether there are any
specifc changes in the waste categories
targeted.
The Process
For the current waste audit, the custodial staf
collected all of the garbage at the school on
June 4th, bagged it and placed it aside for use in
the waste audit.
Sorting categories
Ms. Connors class and The Gaia Project decided
on 5 sortng categories:
Paper & Cardboard
Recyclable plastcs
Recyclable Drink Containers
Compost
Garbage
Weighing and Sorting
Afer deciding on our 5 sortng categories,
students were provided with gloves, divided
into teams and provided with a kit of supplies.
Before any bags were opened, the weight of
each bag was recorded so that the startng
amount of waste was known and could be
checked against the fnal amount.
Groups then opened the bags and sorted its
contents.
We subsequently weighed the contents of each
sortng category at the end of the audit. The
data from each group was entered into an MS
Excel spreadsheet so that we could build a
picture of how much waste the school produces
in a day in total and in each of the fve sortng
categories.
Photo courtesy of CBC.

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Results
The total weight of waste collected from one
typical school day was approximately 33 kg, or
approximately 72 lbs. You can fnd the actual
weight from each sortng category (our raw data)
in Table 1 in the Appendix.
The total weight of waste by category can be
seen in the pie chart below.
Finally, the amount of waste collected and sorted
into each category has been projected forward to
provide an estmate of the waste produced on an
annual basis. Assuming 190 school days in a year,
Hazen WhiteSt. Francis School produces
approximately 6,200 kg of waste annually. These
annual projectons can be found in Table 2 in the
Appendix. This is a very rough estmate.
Assuming 170 students that regularly atend
Hazen WhiteSt. Francis School, each student
produces approximately 0.2 kg of waste per day,
and 36 kg annually (thats about 80 pounds).
Summary
Through the process of measuring how much and
what type of waste Hazen White-St. Francis
School produces, it was discovered that on June
5th, 2014:
39% of the waste could have been
recycled. This includes paper, cardboard,
returnable drink containers, and recyclable
plastc.
30% of the waste was compostable
material.
31% of the waste was actual garbage that
needed to be there.
Recommendations
Ms. Connors class and The Gaia Project
brainstormed a variety of recommendatons that
go toward reducing the amount of waste
generated at Hazen White-St. Francis School.
These are described below:
Raise student awareness about putng
paper into the classroom paper recycling
bins.
Encourage the re-use of paper (i.e. paper

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used only on one side)
Make bigger signs for the recycling bins.
Include pictures on the signs to make it
clear which item goes in which type of
recycling.
Bring your lunch in re-usable containers
and avoid keeping it in baggies.
Work with other students, teachers, and
staf members to develop a school
compost program.
Place small compost bins in each
classroom.
Re-use boxes and fllable water botles.

With complete recycling of all possible materials
and a full compostng program, Hazen WhiteSt.
Francis School could reduce its annual waste
producton to 1,900 kg (a 70% reducton), which
is only 11kg per student per year and 60 grams
per day!
Contact Us
The Gaia Project is very interested in supportng
waste reducton and other energy-related
initatves at Hazen WhiteSt. Francis School in
any that we can. This includes getng a start on
any of the ideas generated by students above.
I look forward to discussing this report with the
school soon!



Miles Gof, Technical & Program Ofcer
miles.gof@thegaiaproject.ca
www.thegaiaproject.ca
1 (506) 442-9030

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Table 1. Weight (kg) per sortng category.
Table 2. Estmated annual weight (kg) per sortng class
Appendix
Group
Returnable
Drink Con-
tainers (kg)
Recyclable
Plastcs (kg)
Paper &
Cardboard
(kg)
Compost (kg) Garbage (kg) Total (kg)
1 0.4 0.7 2.3 2.4 1.8 7.5
2 0.4 0.5 1.8 1.6 1.7 5.9
3 1.6 0.6 2.7 4.3 5.2 14.3
4 0.3 1.6 0.2 1.6 1.4 5.1
Total 2.6 3.4 7.0 9.8 10.0 32.7
Sortng Class Daily (kg) Annual (kg)
Returnable Drink Containers 2.63 500
Recylable Plastcs 3.37 640
Paper & Cardboard 6.95 1,320
Compost 9.82 1,870
Garbage 9.97 1,900
Total 32.7 6,200