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E-News: Green Star's Electronic, Environmental Newsletter!
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| Green Star E-News Vol. 2, No. 7 July 10, 2001 Recognizing businesses committed to environmental responsibility. In this issue: * Shining Stars: Kaladi Brothers Coffee, Arctic Wire Rope & Supply * Upcoming Events and Workshops * Green Events Update * Recycling 101: Cardboard * Tips for Environmentally Preferable Purchasing * This Month’s Hot Link: Girmscheid Enterprises * Thank You 2001 Sponsors SHINING STARS Arctic Wire Rope & Supply and Kaladi Brothers Coffee, two Green Star members, have teamed up to prevent waste and reuse materials. Kaladi Brothers donates used burlap coffee bags to Arctic Wire Rope & Supply for the shipment of its products around Alaska. The partnership has been going on since Winter. Rope, wire, nylon webbing products, and any related hardware fit nicely in the bags and are easy to carry. Send your examples of Shining Stars to betsy@greenstarinc.org. . ================================= UPCOMING EVENTS AND WORKSHOPS Greening the Government: General Services Administration will be hosting a local “Greening the Government Workshop” on July 25, 2001. This is your opportunity to find out all you ever wanted to know about Alternative Fuel Vehicles and how to procure Environmentally Friendly office supplies. The workshop will be held at the Susitna Club on Elmendorf Air Force Base from 7:30 – 4:30. If you would like to attend please contact Jenna Crowson at (907) 271-3941 and reserve your spot early, space is limited. Recycling Brown Bag: Wednesday, August 1st, 11:00-1:00pm, 619 E. Ship Creek Ave, Ste. 309. Join Green Star for a continuing discussion about recycling in the workplace. At this brown bag lunch, we will provide you with an opportunity to share your recycling experiences, successes, and frustrations. Learn from your peers and develop specific strategies that will help improve recycling at your business. We invite newcomers as well as those who participated in our first recycling presentation held in mid-June. Green Star will facilitate the discussion and offer suggestions but the program will be yours to get from it what you need. Businesses of all sizes are welcome. Bring your own lunch. Coffee and cookies will be provided. Space is limited. RSVP by July 20th at 278-7827, or betsy@greenstarinc.org. Remember the Plastics One-Stop on Saturday, July 14th. Bring your plastic bottles, jugs, and bags to the Anchorage Recycling Center on Rosewood Street (off Dowling). ================================ GREEN EVENTS UPDATE A Green Event is a public event that has agreed to reduce waste and provide recycling bins for public use. Bins are available for free use through Green Star. Contact jeanne@greenstarinc.org for more information. Green Events continues to be successful with several events recycling in June. In fact on June 23rd, a total of four events were recycling simultaneously. The Saturday Market continued its recycling activities; the Mayor's Midnight Sun Marathon set up recycling bins for plastic bottles at the finish line; the Scottish Highland Games in Eagle River set up bins for plastic, aluminum, and glass throughout the event; and Habitat for Humanity collected cans and bottles during its Blitz Build in Mountain View. All in all, several thousand people were able to put their beverage containers in recycling bins. During July, the Downtown Partnership's Live After Five concert on July 19th will be recycling. ================================ RECYCLING 101: CARDBOARD This article is the sixth in a continuing series on the materials recyclable in Anchorage. Corrugated cardboard is cardboard with the inner waffled ("corrugated") layer covered by two flat outer layers. It is what the typical cardboard box is made of. It is NOT the material in cereal boxes, paper towel tubes, or six-pack carriers. This flat gray, brown, or white material is called boxboard, grayboard, or paperboard and it is typically NOT recycled with corrugated cardboard. It is included in mixed paper. The National Picture According to the U.S. EPA, the U.S. generated 30.16 million tons of corrugated cardboard in 1997. Approximately 67% of that was recovered for recycling, leaving 9.87 million tons to be discarded. Cardboard in Anchorage In 1997, Anchorage residents generated 1.87 million tons of cardboard. Only 15% are recovered for recycling, which is much lower than the national average. Since Smurfit-Stone owns pulp and paper facilities in the Lower 48, cardboard collected for recycling is baled and shipped to one of the company's own facilities after it is dropped off at the recycling center. How Do I Recycle Cardboard? The "Cardboard" category includes corrugated cardboard boxes, clean corrugated cardboard pizza boxes, corrugated box inserts, and brown (called "kraft") paper bags, such as grocery bags. There is a 24-hour drop-off bin located at the Anchorage Recycling Center, 6161 Rosewood Street off Dowling. If your business is interested in recycling cardboard, Anchorage Refuse offers recycling dumpster collection services. Call 563-3717 for more information about commercial recycling services. Girmscheid Enterprises Curbside Recycling service also offers businesses the opportunity to recycling cardboard. Call 770-1720 for more information. Resources American Forest and Paper Association http://www.afandpa.org ================================ TIPS FOR ENVIRONMENTALLY PREFERABLE PURCHASING Purchasing is the most important part of waste reduction in your business. Everything that you use, store, discard, or recycle was, at some point and in some form, purchased. Your purchasing decisions can go a long way toward reducing waste and creating a more efficient workplace. Below are some purchasing tips, resources, and links to help you purchase environmentally preferable products and services. Price Preferences Many state and local governments, as well as the federal government, use price preferences for recycled products to overcome the lowest bid requirement. Despite increased progress toward comparable pricing with virgin products, some environmentally preferable products still may cost more than their alternatives. The State of Alaska has a 5% price preference for recycled-content products purchased for state projects. Link to Alaska Department of Community and Economic Development, Division of Trade and Development at www.dced.state.ak.us/trade/prodpref.htm#Alaska Product Preference/ for more information about the price preference. Businesses may wish to develop price preferences when writing competitive bid requests or simply when writing purchasing policy. Life Span Analysis Life span analysis looks at the total cost of a product or service from purchase through disposal, rather than just the purchase cost. It tells you how much the product REALLY costs. Initial costs: These are the costs to acquire and establish use of a product, including the purchase price, shipping costs and the cost of installation, including the cost of providing access to water and electricity, if necessary. Training costs: Training costs may include materials and labor to prepare current employees to use the product or material properly, as well as new employee orientation and ongoing refresher courses. Operating and maintenance costs: O & M costs include annual parts, labor and supplies for routine operations, as well as preventive maintenance and repairs over the life of the product or equipment. O & M also includes the cost of gas, electricity and water to operate equipment. Disposal costs: These are the costs to dispose of operating and maintenance supplies and associated packaging wastes during the functional life of the product, as well as the costs associated with final disposal when the product is not operating or no longer needed. A life span analysis may be based on simple, average annual costs. Purchasing agents can use life span analysis as a tool to determine the most cost effective and efficient products. Research Using life span analysis and identifying new and alternative products takes some time and effort. You'll need to consider this and designate some time for researching your options. See the resources at the end of this article for places to start. Also, listen to your staff and ask for suggestions when it comes to alternative product and service ideas. Bid Specifications Incorporating environmentally preferable purchasing into your bidding process will ensure that more of your products and services are "green." First, you may want to eliminate these common barriers to buying environmentally preferable products: *requires new products only; *requires virgin content only; *requires that recycled content not be used; *requires light, or clear color in non-paper products (e.g., plastic bags); or *requires high brightness levels for paper; Below are a few of the environmental attributes you should be looking for when purchasing products. These concepts can help guide you in including appropriate language in your bid specifications: *Prevents waste: reusable, rechargeable, remanufactured, Reduces toxicity: specify toxic constituent(s) to be reduced or eliminated, *Recycled content: specify material and percentage, *Recyclable: Municipal collection or private vendor, *Packaging reduction: Vendor will take back packaging, reusable packaging, reduced packaging, and *Product leased; vendor will take back product at the end of its useful life. In addition, the product needs to meet performance criteria/specifications. Be sure to provide enough information in the Invitation to Bid so vendors are able to supply comparable technical data for easy bid comparison in both performance criteria and environmental attributes. A more in-depth version of this article can be found on our website at http://www.greenstarinc.org/epp.htm. ================================= THIS MONTH’S HOT LINK Are you interested in setting up a recycling pick-up service for your home or business? Girmscheid Enterprises, an Anchorage based company, provides weekly or monthly pick-ups for a variety of recyclable materials. For a list of services and rates, visit the Girmscheid website at http://sites.netscape.net/suzygirmscheid/curbsiderecycling ================================= THANK YOU 2001 SPONSORS Platinum:Phillips Alaska, Alaska Science & Technology Foundation, Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, Municipality of Anchorage Solid Waste Services Gold: AT&T Wireless, Alaska Conservation Foundation, BP Bronze: Sam’s Club, Smurfit Stone Recycling Supporter: Alaska Wildland Adventures, Pepsi Cola Bottling of Anchorage ,Yukon Equipment, Spenard Builders Supply In-kind: National Bank of Alaska, Data Pro, Phillips Alaska, 2011 Enterprises, Shoot-N-Edit, Desert Ice ================================= Please send comments, questions, or suggestions for future E-News topics to us at betsy@greenstarinc.org. Forward this newsletter freely. Send us any e-mail addresses you wish to add to our mailing list. Thank you! The staff of Green Star, Anchorage: Sean Skaling, Executive Director Jeanne Carlson, Recycling Program Coordinator Betsy Goll, Membership & Communications Coordinator If you would like to discontinue receiving E-News, please write betsy@greenstarinc.org. |
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