WIN/WIN RECYCLING EFFORT KICKS OFF IN FIRST-YEAR RESIDENCE HALLS
Date: April 18, 2008

Among the many sustainability programs that have sprouted recently across the country, RecycleBank is surely one of the most creative. That’s because its rewards benefit both the Earth and the program participants, most recently first-year students on Columbia’s Morningside campus.

Columbia is the first university in the country to take part in the incentive-driven recycling program, and is the only location in New York City where it’s underway. Nilda Mesa, Assistant Vice President, Environmental Stewardship, says that Columbia’s goal in introducing RecycleBank is to improve and increase recycling rates. “It’s cutting edge, new and different, and this semester’s pilot project will be evaluated at the end of the semester. If it works the way we think it will based on past experience, we’ll be rolling it out campuswide in the fall,” she says.

Mesa says that more than 50 percent of students eligible to participate in the pilot have signed up as of mid-April, with momentum continually growing.

RecycleBank (http://www.recyclebank.com/columbia) operates around kiosks that have been installed in first-year residence halls Carman, Furnald, Hartley, John Jay and Wallach. Many residents have already received recycling bags and key fobs embedded with bar codes; resident assistants will finish the distribution. It’s up to students to fill their bags with glass, paper or plastic bottles, tote them to any of the kiosks, weigh them, swipe the key fobs they’ve received to access their personal accounts, enter the weight of their recyclables, then dispose of the recyclables as they would normally in Columbia containers. Stickers on the bins clearly explain what’s recyclable and what isn’t.The tangible rewards come into play at this point: For every pound of recyclables weighed and deposited, a student receives a RecycleBank dollar, redeemable at numerous local vendors including H&M, American Apparel, Blue Java, Pinkberry, Starbucks, Chipotle, Apple Tree Supermarket, Liberty House and Amir’s Falafel.
In the near future, recycling dollars may be contributed to Columbia Community Service, which works with numerous local not-for-profit service organizations. Also in the works is an arrangement with a major corporate sponsor, in which the company will match every RecycleBank dollar donated to Columbia Community Service.

RecycleBank was founded by CEO Ron Gonen, Columbia Business School ’04, and a longtime friend, President Matt Tucker. Gonen conceived the idea while at Columbia, and it received seed capital from the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurial Initiative.

The program has expanded from its initial testing ground in two Philadelphia neighborhoods in 2005 to towns and cities in New Jersey, Delaware, Vermont and Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania.

According to statistics from a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency website, the Chestnut Hill neighborhood in Philadelphia with a 20 percent recycling rate and the West Oak Lane neighborhood with 7 percent jumped to better than 50 percent recycling rates and 90 percent participation rates in just the first six months of their affiliation with RecycleBank.

A promotional video shown at the 2007 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, notes RecyleBank’s success in Wilmington, Del., since 2006. According to the video, Wilmington’s almost complete lack of recycling immediately soared to 30 percent and has continued to increase. (www.environmentalleader.com/2008/01/31)

Columbia is also the first RecycleBank location to test the system in a multi-unit residential setting. If the kiosk system works, it would also lay the groundwork for making the system available in large urban areas with few single-family homes. The success of the trial could have impact well beyond the Morningside campus.

RecycleBank’s story was the subject of an article in the April 11, 2008 online edition of TIME. For most of the following week, the piece was both the second most popular story as well as the second most e-mailed. The story talked about Columbia as the pioneering site for RecycleBank’s potential expansion onto college campuses. (www.time.com)