Cleveland Indians lead the way in waste management initiatives

The Cleveland Indians, in partnership with the Natural Resources Defense Council, have taken on the challenge of managing their high volume waste and are succeeding in a significant way. Since its inaugural year in 1994, Progressive Field (then Jacobs Field) has provided recycling receptacles for plastic, cardboard and aluminum. When the facility’s waste hauling contract expired in late 2007, the operations team stepped up their waste management efforts to establish the ballpark as an industry leader.

In 2008, Brad Mohr, assistant director of ballpark operations, forged new partnerships with local waste management companies and arranged for the separation of waste from recyclables on-site. To do this the team purchased two balers that create 1200-pound cubes of cardboard and 500-pound ready-for-sale cubes of plastic or aluminum. With the money they saved from these machines they were able to pay off the $30,000 cost within six months.

In three years the team was able to cut their annual waste in half, which subsequently reduced the number of trash compactor pickups, saving the team $50,000 in those three years. Mohr is confident the ballpark will continue to save at least $50,000 or more each year with its improved waste management program. Not only has this program reduced the ballpark’s environmental impact, it has also created local jobs; extra custodial staff are hired for each game to help pick up recyclables around the ballpark.

The Tellus Institute launched a report last week entitled “More Jobs, Less Pollution” at an event hosted by the Indians at Progressive Field. This event took place alongside a number of events across the country on National Recycling Day, which was November 16. The event was also a showcase of the great initiatives the team has implemented to reduce and reuse waste.

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Responsible Packaging – The Great Debate

Many companies use plastic in their products, packaging and packing of their packaged products – which amounts to a lot of responsibility for the customer and end consumer!  27% of PET containers were recycled in 2008, which pales in comparison to the 2,500,000 plastic bottles that Americans use every hour.[1]^,[2]  Environmental groups say one of the biggest problems with plastic bottles is that consumers do not recycle them.  So, how responsible are the new plant-based and compostable packages?

Solutions to Plastic Pollution

It’s hard to imagine what life was like without plastic.  It’s everywhere: covering our food, holding our purchases, protecting our sports stars, rolling along the highway, saving patients in hospitals and floating along our waterways and oceans.

The United Nations Environment Program estimated in 2006 that every square mile of ocean hosts 46,000 pieces of floating plastic.

During a recent team meeting at BrownFlynn, we started brainstorming potential (generally ridiculous) solutions to cleaning up The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.  This Garbage Patch the size of Texas has accumulated in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, where ocean currents push the pieces of (mostly) plastic into a particularly inhospitable whirlpool.  It’s growing in size and every year people find other similar garbage patches around the world’s oceans.

Photo from students.umf.maine.edu/learykp/public.www/

The main problem with this is that the plastic deeply affects ocean habitats and ends up in our own bodies.  The pieces of plastic break down into smaller particles, making them extraordinarily difficult to clean up, and the plastic particles both absorb and release toxic chemicals in the water, making them small pieces of contamination.  Fish eat these plastic particles, mistaking them for plankton, and end up saturated with the toxins that were absorbed in the plastic.  Guess who eats the fish.