Sustainability and Agriculture

Waste Audit

Aitken College is currently undertaking a waste and litter audit as part of being a ResourceSmart School. The Benchmark as set by Sustainability Victoria is 0.3m³ per student per year. Aitken College is currently at 0.3³ – so we are looking at ways to reduce the amount of waste that goes into landfill.

Last week an audit was conducted on what type of waste is going into our landfill bins (Figure 1) and co-mingle recycle bins (Figure 2). 

Figure 1. Breakdown of waste going into landfill bins

Figure 2. Breakdown of waste going into our Co-mingle bins

The results in Figure 1 show that most of the waste that is going into our landfill bins should be placed in our bokashi compost bins or our co-mingle recycle bins. The results in figure 2, which illustrates the type of rubbish going into our co-mingle recycle bins, we can see 25% is made of soft plastics and 20% is organic waste. Our Sustainability Leaders presented these results at our school assemblies this week and the Sustainability Committee will analyse these results at the next meeting to look at strategies that we can implement to improve our waste management moving forward.

We encourage all members of the school community to assist Aitken College to reduce the amount of waste that is going into landfill. For example, making a conscious effort to dispose of our waste in the appropriate bins or trying to reduce the amount packaging (soft plastics) that food comes to school in (Nude food).

Mr Dwayne Ganci

Sustainability Coordinator