Having reached crisis levels of plastic waste, Recycle Coach implemented a short-term, targeted campaign that resulted in lower contamination rates in Newark, DE.
Background
The City of Newark, DE approached us with a common dilemma. How do they teach residents that plastic bags can't be recycled and recyclables shouldn't be bagged?
Newark had reached crisis levels of plastic waste, with residents who wanted to help but weren't sure how. Plastic bags often end up in the recycling stream, causing terrible outcomes for the local environment, broken machinery, and most importantly, an increase of contaminated materials headed straight for the landfill.
Solution
To better understand the problem at hand, the City of Newark audited the recycling bins of 25 random residential homes. On inspection, loose plastic bags and bags used in the collection of other recyclables were counted, and in total, 29 plastic bags were found in the random sample.
To lower the number of plastic bags ending up in recycling, we launched a month-long lesson on the mobile app to educate residents all about plastic bags and how to dispose of them.
Results
After the end of the Campaign, the City of Newark conducted another recycling audit. On inspection, only 5 plastic bags were found, proving that when given targeted information, residents are quick to change their recycling habits.
Key Takeaway
Connecting residents to the information and education that they need, local problems can be solved with cost-effective localized solutions.
The demand for recycling improvement in Newark is high so there isn't room for investing in slow-change systems. A key area of concern has been reducing plastic bag contamination, so we decided to conduct a test study using Recycle Coach. After an initial waste audit, we rolled out the program and shortly after that saw an 82% reduction in bagged recyclables thrown away inthe recycling. With insights from Recycle Coach's platform on resident behavior, we look forward to having the same impact in other problem areas.
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