ACCESSIBILITY POLICY
A Quality Program of Associated Students

HOW TO PLAN & EXECUTE
A ZERO WASTE EVENT

    • Have a zero-waste mindset.
    • Remember that "zero waste" isn't about perfection. Instead, it is most important to consider the upstream1 and downstream2 impacts of the materials we use, with an ultimate goal of minimizing contributions to the landfill through diversion3.
    • In an effort to protect the health of the community, Senate Bill 1383 and Senate Bill 1335 were signed into California state law in 2016 and 2018 respectively. The passage of these bills means that all houses, businesses, and schools must participate in composting procedures and that all food-service packaging distributed in state-owned facilities must be fully reusable, compostable, or recyclable. Both of these laws apply to all events held on the San Diego State University campus, making a zero waste mindset a high priority for our event planning teams!
    • Make the experience as simple as possible for attendees.
    • Providing a variety of compostable, recyclable, and landfill-bound materials is confusing to guests and will result in unintentional contamination4.
    • We suggest achieving simplicity by ensuring every material provided to attendees is either reusable or verified compostable (see step 3). This includes easily forgotten disposable items like sauce packets, creamer cups, and stir sticks!
    • If you are working with a food service vendor and they do not already serve food and beverages in verified compostable packaging, provide the vendor with alternative packaging that you have pre-approved for verified compostability.
    • Verify that your waste hauler can truly accept all of your compostable items for composting.
    • EDCO employees working to turn compostable waste into soil.

      SDSU is serviced by the waste hauler EDCO, who hauls compostable waste to their commercial composter in Escondido. While this facility is amazing at turning food and natural5 fibers into soil, the system cannot break down bioplastics, such as the clear beverage cups or plastic-looking cutlery and straws labeled "compostable." These bioplastic6 products cannot be recycled in the blue bin, either, so it's best to avoid purchasing them entirely.

    • Soil created from compostable waste.

      Only fiber and pulp-based disposables are acceptable in our campus compost stream, such as bamboo, paper, wood, bagasse, and parchment. If using paper items, avoid paraffin wax coatings. Paraffin is derived from petroleum and is not compostable. Instead, opt for PLA-coated paper products. Although PLA is a type of bioplastic, when it is only used as a coating it is thin enough to decompose properly at EDCO’s composting facility.

    • When considering different options, the best possible option would be one that has sustainable upstream sourcing. Look for items that are FSC-certified, which means the materials (such as wood, paper, or bamboo) were grown and harvested ethically.
    • Opt for bulk options instead of single-serve packaged goods.
    • A member of GreenLove making use of donated mugs to get coffee. Various sweeteners in bowls sitting on a catering stand. Carafes filled with various dairy products sit next to a stack of paper cups. A member of GreenLove stands next to a table of baked goods.
    • If water is going to be served, try to serve it via a dispenser and compostable or reusable cups.
    • If you're having coffee and tea catered, request bulk sugar in a bowl with a spoon and creamers in reusable carafes instead of plastic packets that cannot be composted or recycled.
    • Instead of providing snacks in individually wrapped bags or packets, purchase bulk equivalents like granola, trail mix, candy, etc. from stores like The Mighty Bin or Sprouts. Serve these in a large reusable dispenser or platter with reusable serving utensils.
    • Ensure your venue is equipped with a composting collection process and signage.
    • Meet with the scheduled custodial team prior to the event to show them which waste stream (compost, recycle, or landfill) the disposable items you are providing should go to. This ensures that the custodial team can knowledgeably remove contamination after the event.
    • If you've successfully purchased all compostable disposable items for your event, simplify the experience, for attendees by only placing green compost receptacles around the venue, or cover the blue recycling and black landfill containers with large pieces of paper.
    • Place a sign on or above the green compost bins that have photos of the food and compostable disposables provided at your event. Include the message: “Everything from this event can be composted!"
    • If aluminum bottles or cans must be provided, ensure there is a blue recycling bin next to every green compost bin, and post event-specific signage. Here is an example of signage.
  • A river with arrows showing the direction of flow moving from bottom to top.
    1 Upstream: In sustainability, we use the metaphor of waste "streams" being like a river, where materials flow from one place to another. The mining, cultivation, manufacturing, transportation, and sale of materials before use or consumption are considered "upstream".
  • River rocks
    2 Downstream: Similarly to “upstream”, “downstream” refers to the river metaphor of material flow. Impacts of a material after its use or consumption, such as during the processes of reuse, donation, or management of waste products, are considered “downstream.”.
  • No to landfills
    3 Diversion: Alternative waste processing methods to landfills or incineration, such as recycling, composting, reuse, donation, or opting out of purchasing the material completely.
  • Workers sorting out different types of waste from each other.
    4 Contamination: Anything placed incorrectly in diversion streams, such as plastic or metal in a compost stream, or food waste in a recycling stream.
  • A newly sprouting plant.
    5 Natural: In the context of these zero waste guidelines, natural fibers are grown from the earth and can be physically processed but not chemically synthesized by humans.
  • A compostable cup.
    6 Bioplastic: This is a kind of plastic synthesized by manufacturers out of modified biological materials, unlike food or natural fibers.