“As society continues to produce more and more waste I think it’s irresponsible to call glass waste, and reusing, recycling is the only way to help the problem,” President of the Sustainability Club President Seth Cude said.
It has been more than a year since Laramie stopped offering glass recycling, yet the issue still remains a contentious topic for the city and its residences.
Since Ark Regional Services shut down the service, many different groups have taken up the cause of recycling glass.
Throughout the past year many clubs and organizations have come together aiming to handle Laramie’s glass.
Many of these organizations, such as the Wyoming Conservation Corp, worked on collecting glass contributed by the community at large drop-off sites to bring it to Colorado to be recycled.
City Council has even created a glass recycling committee to help brainstorm and implement ideas for county wide recycling.
Some students on campus have taken this issue to heart.
UW junior Meghan Neville, an environment and natural resources major, thinks that the community needs to do more about the issue.
“It is vital that we decrease our waste so as to not overfill the landfill, and prioritize reusing glass, instead of creating new glass, in order to conserve energy and pollute less,” Neville said.
On Oct. 30, Laramie citizens shared a number of ideas about the issue in a glass-recycling meeting at the Albany County Courthouse, which was open to the public to discuss and participate.
Ideas discussed included taking your own recycling to the landfill. For this system to work, citizens would have to pay an $11 gate fee.
Another idea was to have drop off locations for glass; although it was assessed, it would cost several thousands to start up with the cost of trucks and bins. If this were put in place it would also cost residences an additional $5 a month.
There was also talk of working with local cities and constructing a regional recycling center. However, these were only proposed ideas. Said Seth Cude, president of the Sustainability Club.
“As society continues to produce more and more waste I think it’s irresponsible to call glass waste, and reusing, recycling is the only way to help the problem,” President of the Sustainability Club President Seth Cude said. “I think it’s really important to the town of Laramie and I’ve seen a lot of student support. One important thing people can do is contact the city and let them know we want it back.”
