Sustainability Committee Reports
Redcycle Information
The Redcycle bins have been put in every grade in the school. Some grades have been putting paper/paper towel in the bins. This has been an issue as the sustainability leaders have to go through the rubbish to remove it. This rule applies to all of the bins in the school.
Please put scrunchable plastics in the Redcycle bins, paper in the paper bins, recyclable waste in the mixed recycling bins and paper towel in the normal bins.
Paper towel vs hand dryers
Last year the sustainability leaders looked into how much paper towel is wasted at this school, we have been researching alternatives such as hand dryers. We began to do more research on how the hand dryers would affect the hygiene of the staff and students, the cost and how it would impact the environment. After researching we decided that hand dryers may not be the best option for our school.
This is a chart we made to represent the pros and cons of paper towels and hand dryers.
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Paper Towel Pros |
Paper Towel Cons
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Quicker Cheaper More Hygienic |
Less sustainable Used Inappropriately Wasted
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Hand Dryer Pros
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Hand Dryer Cons
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More Sustainable Less Paper Waste |
Slower Unhygienic (Bacteria spread) Expensive (Product cost/management) Could Be Used Inappropriately |
Recommendations
As the table shows, the hand dryers may not be as good as we had hoped so we have decided to stick with paper towel. However a lot of paper towel is wasted at this school and we would like to advise everyone to not use a lot of it when drying your hands.
Remember, with paper towel, one will do.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2011/nov/11/paper-towels-drying-hands-energy
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/the-bacteria-horror-of-the-hot-air-hand-dryer-2018051113823
Accessed on 7/6/2019
From the Sustainability Leaders – Melaiyne Harding, Sienna Dutton and Libby Hardstaff