What have you done for Mother Earth lately? Donated more than 10,000 pounds of clothing and other reusable items to charity? Collected 103,000 gallons of water from your dripping air conditioner? Fed your excess fish to the wolves?

If your answer is “None of the above,” you must not be one of the top business recyclers recognized this month at the city of San Diego’s 25th annual Waste Reduction Awards Ceremony. But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn from them.

With Earth Day 2017 arriving on April 22 and San Diego’s EarthWork’s annual EarthFair taking over Balboa Park on April 23, it’s time to kick your ecological engines into high gear. Whether it is Point Loma Nazarene University’s guilt trip to “Mount Trashmore” or the Hazard Center’s adventures in composting, here are some expert tips for doing your small part to beautify the bigger picture. Wolves not included.

Tip No. 1: Back to basics

It begins with the bins, even for the people who have a bunch of them. If you want to do your part to reduce waste, you can start by knowing what goes in your blue recycling bin and what goes in your black trash bin. Styrofoam packaging and plastic clamshell packaging? Blue bin. Food wrappers and Styrofoam food and drink containers? Black bin. Glass jars? Blue bin. Wine glasses? Black bin.


Confusion? Everywhere.

“People still struggle with what plastics you can and cannot recycle. It is not easy,” said Brendan Reed, director of environmental affairs for the San Diego Regional Airport Authority, one of five Outstanding Achievement Award winners. “The city provides a lot of great material on that. We call the city of San Diego all the time asking for suggestions and input.”

Point Loma Nazarene University’s “Mount Trashmore” shows students the “trash” that can be recycled. (Courtesy photo)

To educate yourself, go to the city of San Diego’s Environmental Services website (recyclingworks.com), which has information on everything from how to reduce food waste to finding someone who will recycle your mattress. Click on the “What Can Be Recycled?” link for the indispensable Curbside Recycling Flyer, which tells you which items go in which bin, which items can be composted and which items qualify as hazardous waste. You can reach them by phone at (858) 694-7000. (Speaking of hazardous waste, San Diego’s next used oil and oil filter recycling event is April 22 at Montgomery High School.)


For another small step with big impact, embrace the state’s ban on single-use plastic carryout bags. Keep a stash of reusable shopping bags in your car and a compact carryall in your purse and/or backpack. You might think it doesn’t matter, but you would be wrong.

“When our rescue team goes out to return animals (to the ocean), it is not unusual to see a plastic bag floating on the water,” said Dave Koontz, director of communications for Outstanding Achievement Award winner SeaWorld San Diego, which eliminated all single-use plastic bags from its gift shops in 2011. “Unfortunately, sea animals will mistake those bags for jellyfish, and they will ingest that. We have pulled plastic bags from inside animals we have rescued. We have seen how detrimental these bags can be to animals in the ocean.”

Tip No. 2: Give it away now

In the waste-reduction world, the three R’s stand for Reduce, Reuse then Recycle. You can knock off the first two by donating the clothes, furniture and electronics you don’t need to nonprofit organizations.

The Hazard Center complex in Mission Valley — winner of a Rising Star award — holds an annual recycling event in which tenants can shred old paperwork, recycle electronic waste, and donate clothes and furniture to Father Joe’s Villages. And last year, students and staff at Point Loma Nazarene University, a frequent winner of the city’s Recycler of the Year award, donated more than 10,000 pounds of clothing and other items to schools and orphanages in Mexico.


“We recycle e-waste, we recycle scrap metal and food waste, and we do a lot of donations, especially around move-out time at the end of the semester,” said Trisha Stull, the university’s sustainability officer. “As a Christian university, we feel we are called to be stewards of the environment and God’s creation, so that philosophy is built into our sustainability initiatives.”

For help on your own sustainability initiatives, the San Diego Rescue Mission, Father Joe’s Villages and Goodwill San Diego offer pick-up services for larger items or big collections. All three organizations also have multiple drop-off sites.

Tip No. 3: Don’t fear the compost

Like other waste-reduction award winners, SeaWorld and Hazard Center are part of the city’s Commercial Food Waste Recycling Program, where meticulously sorted food scraps are processed into compost, which can be purchased at the Miramar Greenery at the Miramar Landfill. (City residents can self-load up to two cubic yards of compost for free, with proof of residency.)

Part of the city’s three-point climate action plan is recycling food waste into compost at the Miramar Landfill. (Union-Tribune File Photo)


If you want to take the composting plunge, you will have to do your composting at home. The city’s compost voucher program provides residents with discount vouchers on one of three styles of compost bins. The city also offers free workshops and a more in-depth Master Composter Course. For information and forms, go online to the Environmental Services Backyard Composting page, or call the “Rotline” at: (760) 436-7986, ext 222.

“Where I used to live, I had a little composting container in my backyard, and it was actually kind of fun,” said Jayne Vanderhagen, property administrator at PMRG, which manages Hazard Center, where the food-service tenants are composting more than 18 cubic yards of food per week.

“I had this little decorative pot with a lid, and instead of throwing that broccoli spear down the garbage disposal, I would put it in the pot and put it out with the composting. Then you just kind of stir it up, and you’re done. It’s a lot easier than you think it’s gong to be, and the dirt was amazing.”

Tip No. 4: Get creative

When SeaWorld San Diego finds itself with an excess of fresh fish, that fish used to end up at a rendering plant. Now, it is donated to feed the animals at the California Wolf Center, a nonprofit conservancy and research center near Julian. When members of the Point Loma Nazarene sustainability staff want to remind students about the importance of recycling, they construct “Mount Trashmore,” a guilt-inducing pile made from recyclable waste retrieved from the campus’ trash bins.


And when an operations employee at the San Diego International Airport noticed that condensation from the air conditioning units under the passenger boarding bridges was leaving big puddles on the ground, the Airport Authority put 55 gallon drums at 14 gates, a small thing that ended up saving 103,000 gallons of water last year. The water was used for cleaning equipment, power-washing sidewalks and dust control at airport construction sites.

Whether you are a big business or just a big-hearted citizen, there are ecological rewards for thinking outside the box. Just don’t forget to break down the box when you’re through. It goes in the blue bin.

“I always say, ‘Take baby steps,’” said Steve Weihe, recycling specialist with the city of San Diego. “Every day is a challenge, and if you can do something every day, you are getting to that goal.”


Twitter: @karla_peterson

karla.peterson@sduniontribune.com