Jul

It’s not easy being green–but it’s getting easier

Interns and volunteers collect compost from a Resource Recovery Station at the 2014 Folklife Festival.

The Smithsonian Folklife Festival draws thousands of people each year, who in turn, create thousands of pounds of trash—everything from plastic water bottles to discarded forks and food wrappers to abandoned shopping bags. For the past several years, the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage has worked to create a more sustainable and eco-friendly Festival and this year’s festival is breaking records. Sarah Gaines and Ridley Vann, interns with the Office of Facilities Management and Reliability, have compiled the highlights from the greenest Festival yet.

The 2013 Smithsonian Folklife Festival was the first to offer recycling and composting options for visitors and concession stands−the largest ever for an event on the National Mall.

Approximately 74 percent of the total waste from visitors and concessions was recycled or composted. Bag counts indicated that approximately 20 tons of compostable waste was removed, 16.5 tons of recyclable material was removed, and only an estimated 12.4 tons of waste were taken to a landfill. Volunteers were positioned at resource recovery stations to help educate and guide visitors about responsible waste management practices and recycling.

Sustainability team gives thumbs up in front of trash truck and bags of trash.

Our team collected 19 bags of compostable material from just one station in only three hours. (Photo by Sarah Grimes)

This year, volunteers led by Jacki LaBua hope to further increase the amount of waste diverted from landfills. Resource recovery stations are positioned near seating areas and entry/exit points to maximize visibility and accessibility. Volunteers are trained to identify materials used by vendors, which is challenging, given the variety of plastics and bio-plastics. This task is made much easier when vendors avoid plastic materials and provide compostable products. Stricter contract requirements on concessions products greatly decrease the volume of landfill waste from the festival.

Our goals this year are to prevent vendors from using non-compostable materials and educate visitors while responsibly disposing of waste in order to further reduce the environmental impacts of not only the Folklife Festival but also the Smithsonian as a whole. The recovery stations serve as educational exhibits as well as sources of data for research that will allow us to improve how we handle waste in the future. These efforts come as a response to Executive Order 13154, which mandates that federal facilities achieve 50 percent recycling and diversion of waste from landfills by 2015, among other sustainability goals.

Compostable cup and utensils alongside zip-lock bag of soil

These compostable utensils, made from corn, will become nutrient-rich soil in just eight weeks. (Photo by Francisco Guerra)

So far, the Festival has diverted over 18 tons of waste (91 percent) from landfills in the first five days alone!

For many Folklife Festival visitors, the featured cuisine is a major highlight. However, food and beverage consumption on such a large scale results in a huge volume of waste. Last year, the Festival pioneered a landfill diversion initiative in order to minimize post-consumer waste. Changes included replacing trash bins with resource recovery stations for recycling and compost, and encouraging concessions vendors to use compostable serving containers, cups and utensils. This second piece is crucial to our sustainability program because it kick-starts the entire composting process.

Compostable products can be made of plant starch, paper, sugar cane fiber, bamboo, or even polylactic acid (PLA) which is a plastic derived from corn.

A compostable plastic undergoes degradation by biological processes during composting to yield carbon dioxide, water and inorganic compounds, which leave no visible, distinguishable or toxic residue. These products ease waste disposal after a meal because all food leftovers, cutlery, cups, paper napkins and clamshell containers can go in the compost bin at resource recovery stations. This is a new concept for most visitors, but the Festival staff is glad for this opportunity to educate visitors about eco-friendly methods.