By Wade Walker

There are not enough recycling bins around campus to accommodate the volume of recyclable waste being generated by students. Despite best efforts from enterprising undergrads, the need is greater than their ability to provide satisfactory methods of recycling management. It ultimately falls on the students to take responsibility for their future.

Before 2016 there were no recycling bins at Colorado State University-Pueblo. With roughly 4500 students producing almost 2 pounds of solid waste each day, the landfills are literally filling up.

One group decided to act. CSU-Pueblo Enactus is a group of 20 students who seek to improve the world through action and entrepreneurship. In 2016, they began placing recycling bins throughout the school in an effort to reduce CSU-Pueblo’s ecological footprint.

“We are all still in the beginning stages but there are definite strides being made to get us there” said Annica Roberts, President of CSU-Pueblo Enactus.

The group claims that there are more bins being added but only in the main areas. There are plans to put bins near or inside the classrooms but the teachers would be responsible for providing small totes which would need to be emptied into the larger receptacles after their class.

Roberts says they have received many emails requesting bins from both students and faculty. According to Roberts, they saw a 59 percent increase in recycled goods in the LARC after the bins were placed. Considering there were no bins before they put them there, any increase could appear immense.

Despite their efforts, the current situation is still substandard. The colors change throughout campus and the inconsistency is unnecessarily confusing. There is still a large percentage of recyclable products being thrown into the regular trash bins. Furthermore, some bins are paper only while others include all recyclables. For example, there is a paper only bin in the Administration building but no option to recycle other materials.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, students produce about 640 pounds of waste each year, including paper and disposable cups. They estimate that “75% of the American waste stream is recyclable, but we only recycle about 30% of it.”.

It’s easy to see why the responsibility lies on the students. In the same way that the cleanup was left to the millennials from the baby boomers, so too will the millennial’s grandchildren be left with the cleanup if they decide it wasn’t worth their time to take their plastic bottles to the properly marked bin.

Enactus has gotten the proverbial ball rolling but there is much more to be done. Otherwise, it is the students who will be paying the price when trash island becomes the esteemed nation of Trashylvania, population 10 billion.

The university needs to pay a group of students to handle the recycling responsibilities and make sure the bins in the classrooms get emptied every day. The bins can be donated by alumni, faculty and students.