The recycling team at Menallen Elementary School takes its task seriously because there is a lot at stake.
There’s money on the line, a playground that needs funded and a world that needs saved.
The seven-member team of fifth- and sixth-graders makes its rounds at the start of the school day twice a week to round up recyclable items collected in each classroom.
The school is in competition mode from September to April, going up against a hundred other schools from across the nation in the PepsiCo Recycle Rally to collect the most plastic and aluminum containers. Big money is up for grabs for the top 25 schools.
Recycling bins can be found in every classroom at Menallen, in the cafeteria, in the hallway, in the teachers’ lounge. Students know to recycle their containers at breakfast and lunch.
“It’s ingrained in the students here. We have them trained where they just do it,” said media specialist Christa Sabatula, who with the help of her mother, Janet Gallagher, a retired Laurel Highlands teacher and volunteer at Menallen, has headed the program since its inception by former school principal Paula Work.
The school has operated a recycling program and competed for prizes annually since 2011, said Sabatula, starting with a competition run by New Jersey recycling company TerraCycle, which required students to collect various waste products to be recycled.
Under PepsiCo Recycling’s contest, the school competes in the Challenge League, collecting plastics No. 1 and No. 2, aluminum and tin and self-reporting the collected weight. The school with the highest recycling total over the course of the year wins a grand prize of $50,000, with each subsequent school through 25th place earning an incremental dollar amount down to $1,000.
As of Feb. 20, Menallen ranked No. 15 with approximately 192,000 containers recycled this school year.
In the past, the school has placed as high as 14th, winning $2,000 in 2017.
The awards the school earns through its recycling efforts are funneled into improvements to its playground to expand the play area and ensure handicapped accessibility for special-needs students.
But Sabatula said the program began at the school not to win money, but simply to reduce waste. Being rewarded for their efforts has been a perk.
“There’s no real money coming in unless you win,” said Sabatula. “If you don’t win, you’re still recycling. You’re still doing something good. That’s the point. It helps the environment, and it teaches the kids a lesson.”
The recycling program is especially beneficial to those students who participate on the recycling team, said Sabatula, because it not only makes them environmentally conscious, but it also teaches them about job responsibilities.
“The kids apply for this job. They have to fill out a job application. They need a resume and have to go through an interview process. Once they get the job, they have to maintain good grades,” she said.
Menallen has teamed with Goodwill Industries to haul away the recyclables every Friday to its Fayette Recycling Center in Uniontown, which diverts aluminum cans, tin cans, glass, plastic, cardboard, newspaper and high-grade office paper from going to the landfill.
Collection became so large that the school was routinely filling the six containers reserved for recycling, prompting Menallen Township last school year to lend the school a dumpster to keep on the premises to store recyclables. A second dumpster was added this school year to keep up with collection efforts.
Teachers, staff, parents and community members can drop off their recyclables at a collection area located outside the school.
“The goal is to reach a couple more people every year,” said Sabatula.
But a massive change may be on the horizon. Loop—a new zero-waste platform spearheaded by TerraCycle (a waste company that works to recycle especially challenging materials).
A coalition of major brands—like Procter & Gamble, Nestle, PepsiCo, and Unilever—designed Loop to be convenient, affordable and unobtrusive for consumers. That’s right—we’re not talking about artisanal ice creams and high-end nut butters in reusable packaging. Loop will make many of America’s most popular products zero-waste—like Tide detergent, Häagen Dazs ice cream, Seventh Generation cleaning products, Pantene shampoo, Dove deodorant and Crest mouthwash.
And they’ll deliver them to your door and pick up the empty container up when you’re done, like a modern milkman.
HOW LOOP WILL WORK
When you order your deodorant or detergent or whatever, you’ll pay a small deposit for the bottle. Then, the company will deliver the product in a super-durable, reusable tote, designed by engineers at UPS to withstand many abusive uses. When you finish your products, you can throw them back into the tote. When the tote is full, you simply request a delivery person to pick it up from the Loop website or drop it off at a UPS location.
Everything in the system is designed to withstand at least 100 uses, which is a major step up from the use-and-toss system we have in place right now.
Even if you don’t like the big brands that are partnered with the service, you have to admit that making zero waste a part of the average consumer’s shopping experience would be a major environmental win. Loop is launching its pilot programs this year. As early as this spring, consumers will be able to take part in this new sustainability initiative in both New York City and Paris.
After that, who knows. If Loop is a success, maybe you’ll be able to buy your favorite ice cream flavors in a stainless steel container, too.
To solve the ever-growing problem of too much waste and plastic, a coalition of major consumer product manufacturers is borrowing an old-fashioned idea.
Most Care2 readers probably won’t remember the days when the milkman came to call each morning. He used to bring milk and cream in glass bottles, which customers used and then put outside for him to retrieve. Today, that idea is getting a fresh coat of paint. Thanks to a new marketing platform called Loop, the producers of many of the items you buy will market their goods in reusable, returnable stainless steel containers. That’s called zero-waste packaging, my friends, and its time has come. “While recycling is critically important, it is not going to solve waste at the root cause,” Tom Szaky, CEO and cofounder of TerraCycle, one of the partners behind Loop, told Fast Company. “To us, the root cause of waste is not plastic, per se, it’s using things once, and that’s really what Loop tries to change as much as possible.” There’s a lot of truth in that statement. We buy so much stuff these days because it’s convenient and single-serve. Yes, it’s plastic — but it’s not plastic’s fault. Our love affair with convenience has landed us in the mess the world now faces. Here’s how the Loop platform will work:
Disposability is favored over durability in the global economy because it drives consumption.Even the ubiquitous water bottle, thrown away in the United States at a rate of 60 million plastic water bottles every day, often ends up in the garbage despite being considered recyclable. Thus, single-use items are at best captured by well-managed disposal systems of landfilling and incineration. The rest of it ends up as litter, polluting communities where people live and contaminating the natural world. This systematic tracking of human-made material — material that cannot be absorbed by nature — on a one-way path to disposal is where plastic becomes problematic.
Plastic can be made for reuse and can exist in a circular economy, as can glass, treated paper, lab-grown leather and 3D-printed produce.Waste and disposability has been around only a bit more than 70 years. Is the world ready to go back to reusable packaging? Consumers are used to the convenience and cost of disposable, single-use packages. Bulk and refilling stations that use reusable plastic, stainless steel and glass containers either provided by the retailer or the consumer do exist today, and they work best when consumers are incentivized to use them with discounts and promotions. But business must be on board for such systems to work. Bottle bills and container deposit schemes provide evidence that reusable, returnable packaging configurations work to change the perception that resources are disposable. Today the 10 U.S. states with bottle bills boast a 70 percent average recycling rate, compared with an overall rate of 35 percent. The challenge is that bottle bills not only are not growing but declining due to pressure from industry.
Loop's new recycling program hopes to eliminate waste altogether.TERRACYCLE
Some of the biggest consumer brands are trying out a new way to repurpose packaging. It’s a modern take on an old school model: think of milkmen picking up used milk bottles or recycling glass bottle to get the deposit back.
Last week at Davos, TerraCycle, a US-based waste management company, debuted a new model of recycling, called the Loop, working with global brands like Unilever, P&G, The Clorox Company, Nestle, PepsiCo, Coca Cola European Partners, Danone, and The Body Shop.
It does just as the name suggests: keep “looping” the packaging back to the brand for a refill, instead of throwing it in the bin after just one use. This could be the beginnings of an e-commerce circular shopping system.
Alan Jope, CEO of Unilever, said: “We want to put an end to the current ‘take-make-dispose’ culture and are committed to taking big steps towards designing our products for re-use. We’re proud to be a founding partner of Loop, which will deliver our much-loved brands in packaging which is truly circular by design.”
TerraCycle has been on the business of trash for a decade, recycling waste, and helping brands figure out more eco-friendly alternatives. Despite their successes, Loop required reimagining the current system altogether.
“It took quite a bit of effort to get the founding partners on board: PG, Unilever, Nestle, Mars and PepsiCo as the model requires a major investment of money, time and other resources,” says Tom Szaky, CEO of TerraCycle. “Once these companies joined they set the stage and since then it has been surprisingly easy to bring partners on board.”
Reusable containers with glass and metal would substitute cheap disposable packaging.TERRACYCLE
He admits that it’s more complicated and costly option right now for brands. But at scale, the cost can drop. Same applies for retail partners like Carrefour and Tesco who were first hesitant to sign, but have been easier to convict after Carrefour pioneered the way, being the first grocery retailer to test out Loop.
Laurent Vallée, General Secretary of Carrefour Group, said: “Loop is a disruptive solution led by a visionary entrepreneur. Carrefour has a strong commitment to eliminating waste and plastic. It was a natural fit for Carrefour to commit to this great project, thus becoming the first player in the retail space to join Loop. We believe our clients are increasingly concerned with unnecessary waste and we expect them to embrace this new solution. We hope other international manufacturers and retailers will join us to adopt new standards and fight waste.”
For customers, the prices for Loop products will be comparable to what they would be normally in disposable packaging. However, customers do have to pay a refundable deposit for the durable containers. In the US, this will vary from $0.25 to $10. This is fully refunded when the empty packaging is picked up, no matter what condition it is returned in, Szaky clarifies.
Rather than build a new brand centered around packaging, Loop wants companies and consumers to pay closer attention to the economics of packaging: the current model incentives the cheapest options. Since compostable packaging is still more expensive, big global brands have been slow to adopt.
“The good news is that in Loop you don’t have to trust our products, as they are already the best brands in the world from Tide to Haagen Dazs, and you don’t have to trust us as a retailer. All you have to do is switch from disposable to durable, which gives you the following profound benefits,” he adds.
With some of this new packaging, there may be some added bonuses: for instance, the metal containers keep ice cream frozen longer and wet wipes, well, wetter. Plus, there’s the obvious bonus of less trash to take out every week. By working with UPS and Suez, TerraCycle can use the same routes UPS does daily to deliver packages to pick up the waste. So no drops to recycling units or additional steps for customers.
The idea was conceived at the World Economic Forum; hence it’s debut there this year. Szaky used the convening of these global brands at this annual event to design the system.
To expand on this vision, Szaky has been raising capital through crowdfunding: over $3 million have been raised thus far. Szaky says they’re also raising capital specifically for Loop, which is owned by TerraCycle Global, and requires a fair amount of capital upfront for brands to innovative new types of packaging and a process of refillng.
The pilots with these global brands will unravel this spring and it’s yet to be determined if customers are as eager as brands to solve the waste problem.
| Reusable shampoo bottles (Photo: TerraCycle) |
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The topic du jour (besides the shutdown) was a debate over where the global economy was headed. Chief executives professed confidence that their earnings would continue apace, while economists and investors talked about the prospect of a recession in 2020. And others, like Ray Dalio — and Seth Klarman, who did not attend, but whose annual letter was a constant talking point — worried about social unrest. Interestingly, Dr. Doom — Nouriel Roubini — was actually upbeat. A Chinese chief executive described his country’s economy as “ugly” — he used that world repeatedly — suggesting that the underlying foundation there was more fragile than most economists acknowledge. That could lead to weakness in China spreading to the rest of the world. And the general sense is that while the U.S. and China may reach a trade détente, we might be headed for a decades-long economic cold war. Larry Fink’s letter and the concept of E.S.G., shorthand for “environmental, social and governance,” got a lot of discussion this year — it felt like it might be a tipping point in the dialogue. European companies are still more interested in E.S.G. than U.S. companies, but it feels like a trend that isn’t going away. TPG’s Rise Fund started a new company, Y Analytics, to measure E.S.G. Bono, a board member of Rise, was on hand to talk about impact investing and to support his Red brand, which he started a decade ago in Davos (DealBook broke that story at the time) as well as his One franchise. Matt Damon was in town to raise money for his water.org, which is turning into a quite successful story (side note: Mr. Damon had to borrow a suit because his bag got lost by Swiss Air). Jane Goodall was also in Davos — and let me say that she is as nice as she is important. Even the Vatican sent a delegation to talk about conscious and inclusive capitalism. And Rebecca Blumenstein, the deputy managing editor of The New York Times, interviewed Bill Gates on Twitter about his work around the globe. ____________________________ Today’s DealBook Briefing was written by Andrew Ross Sorkin in Davos, Switzerland; Stephen Grocer in New York; and Tiffany Hsu and Gregory Schmidt in Paris. The U.S. versus China: It’s not a trade war, it’s a tech war The soap opera of tariff negotiations has riveted economists and executives: Will Beijing keep its promises? Will Washington cooperate? But the real drama is not about trade, but about technology, many in Davos have said. The brewing conflict could affect generations and disrupt the world order, according to Fred Kempe, the chief executive of the think tank Atlantic Council. He wrote: The growing danger is that the tech race could become the primary battleground in a struggle between democracy and autocracy — and between China and the U.S. The dangers of a technological Cold War, a zero-sum contest for global dominance that ultimately separates Chinese and U.S. tech sectors from each other and divides up the world, are increasing. What’s the worry? The billionaire George Soros said that artificial intelligence, when in the hands of authoritarian regimes, was a “mortal threat” to the world. He cited China, which is developing a social credit system that would use personal data to judge an individual’s trustworthiness, as an example. President Xi Jinping could eventually have “total control over the people,” making him “the most dangerous opponent of open societies,” Mr. Soros said. What do the Chinese think? The technology industry relies heavily on global interactions and is “probably suffering the most right now,” said Ken Hu, the deputy chairman of Huawei. The Chinese telecommunications company has been accused by multiple nations, including the U.S., of violating trade rules. Other players, such as the Chinese state-owned oil and gas company Sinopec, say they expect Chinese companies to scale back foreign investment — steps already taken by Alibaba and by GAC Motor. Last year, nearly 60 percent of Chinese C.E.O.s considered the U.S. to be the most important foreign market; this year, only 17 percent feel the same, according to one survey published this past week. Hope for resolution? Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said via video link that Washington was willing to play nice with Beijing if China pledged to protect intellectual property. At a dinner in Davos, a top Chinese regulator heard complaints from international business leaders about the ownership structure of state-owned enterprises and about the Made in China 2025 effort, which aims to take the lead in industries such as artificial intelligence and robotics. But China wants its space. Vice President Wang Qishan said in a speech that “it is imperative to respect national sovereignty and refrain from seeking technological hegemony.” He added: We need to respect the independent choices of model of technology management and of public policies made by countries, and their right to participating in the global technological governance system as equals. More forecasts for a global economic slowdown A recession may not be coming this year, but neither is a boom, Greg Ip of the WSJ writes. The International Monetary Fund downgraded its 2019 forecast for global growth to 3.5 percent. That’s a respectable number, he writes, but the world is struggling to sustain even that muted pace. The reason: The world cannot tolerate interest rates as high as it once did. The “neutral” interest rate — one that is high enough to contain inflation, yet low enough to avoid recession — is much lower than before. The underlying cause: As aging workers retire and birthrates drop, the labor force has grown more slowly. Productivity has also eked out smaller gains than in the past. The upshot: Central banks need to proceed carefully, because a little fiscal tightening goes a long way. More on the global economy: Ray Dalio, founder and chairman of the hedge fund Bridgewater, said he foresaw slower growth rates in the U.S. and Europe. France is sticking to a 1.7 percent economic growth forecast for 2019, the French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, said. Christine Lagarde, the managing director of the I.M.F., warned against an overreliance on central banks, urging countries to strengthen their economies through fiscal and structural changes. In the absence of world leaders, the atmosphere was downbeat. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.CreditAndrew Harnik/Associated Press Image Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.CreditAndrew Harnik/Associated Press Tax the rich Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wasn’t in Davos this week. It just felt like she was. The New York representative’s proposal to impose a 70 percent tax rate on income above $10 million came up frequently among the uber-wealthy in attendance. In those elite circles, filled with people whose fortunes have soared in recent years, the idea was not popular. Michael Dell, the billionaire founder of Dell Technologies, is not a fan, for one. Scott Minerd, the chief investment officer of Guggenheim Partners, said the concept was “scary.” Glenn Hutchins, the chairman of North Island and a co-founder of Silver Lake Partners, suggested that it was an attempt to “score political points” and that it would probably be unsuccessful. Ken Moelis, the chief executive of the investment bank Moelis & Company, said it would be “disastrous for the economy.” Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire chief executive of Blackstone, said he was “wildly enthusiastic” about Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s pitch. (He was being sarcastic.) But as the economy slows and 2020 election talk surges, taxing the rich is a topic that will most likely continue to surface. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, a Democratic candidate for president, proposed a so-called ultramillionaire tax this week on the 75,000 wealthiest families in the country, including President Trump’s. Still, top earners would probably figure out how to sidestep such rules, Mr. Minerd said. The political pendulum is swinging. The conservatives found out they’re being held hostage by the extreme right. Now the Democrats are going to find out they’re being held hostage by the extreme left. Defending the international order Globalization had some powerful defenders in Davos, with world leaders imploring delegates not to abandon postwar principles of international integration. Several took jabs at the absent President Trump without mentioning him by name, criticizing his “America First” foreign policy and his habit of provoking trade disputes. The vice president of China, Wang Qishan, whose own country has been accused of running roughshod over foreign competitors and global business rules, nonetheless condemned “practices of the strong bullying the weak and self-claimed supremacy.” Carrie Lam, the chief executive of Hong Kong, said that certain countries were drifting from the multilateral framework of the past few decades. “If that is no longer the mainstream, we could be in trouble,” she said. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, who leads a country that is deeply reliant on international trade and increasingly surrounded by neighbors confronted by protectionist tendencies, urged Western powers to “act against the fragmentation of the international architecture.” She said that global organizations such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank should be reformed and that countries should embrace compromise. She added: I think we should understand our national interest in a way that we think about the interests of others, and from that create win-win situations that are the precondition for multilateralism. Shinzo Abe, the prime minister of Japan, pledged his country’s support for “the free, open, and rules-based international order.” He called on forum participants to “rebuild trust toward the system for international trade.” A call for greater oversight of Big Tech World leaders called for more regulation. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan said his country would push for a new international system for the oversight of data use. His proposal was echoed by others: • The South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, said African Union leaders would discuss greater oversight of the tech sector at a meeting early next month. • Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany cited a need for the European Union to have a “common digital market.” • Vice President Wang Qishan of China also said that more international cooperation in regulating the market was required. Talk focused on global governance, data privacy and the impact of artificial intelligence, but there was no consensus on what approach to take. Some official sessions tried to put a positive spin on the effects of technological advances, but the optimism seemed out of step with public concern about the disruptive effect on privacy and politics. Tech leaders make the rounds: On his first trip to the forum, Tim Cook, the Apple chief executive, met with world leaders, including President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil and Dubai’s crown prince, Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. Sheryl Sandberg, the chief operating officer of Facebook, acknowledged that her company needed to earn back the trust of the public. Microsoft’s chief executive, Satya Nadella, said that as facial recognition technology grew, he would “welcome regulation that will help the marketplace not be a race to the bottom.” The milkman makes a comeback Environmental issues took center stage, with world leaders and celebrities weighing in and new partnerships being formed. One of the biggest initiatives announced at the forum was an alternative recycling platform called Loop, which seeks to change the way consumers buy brand-name products. The concept: The project revives the milkman concept, in which products are delivered in reusable containers that are returned to the manufacturer. The partners: Some of the largest consumer goods companies — including Danone, Mars Petcare, Mondelez International, Nestlé, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble and Unilever — are working together on the project as a way to limit waste. The pitchman: Tom Szaky, founder and chief executive of the recycling company TerraCycle, headed to Davos two years ago to meet with the leaders of packaged goods companies and push his big idea. Climate concerns dominated much of the discussion elsewhere at the gathering: • In an interview with Prince William, the naturalist David Attenborough took world leaders to task for waiting too long to address climate change. • Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern of New Zealand joined the chorus, urging her global counterparts to think about the role they play in addressing climate change, while Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan called for action on the issue. • The singer Bono poked fun at sustainable development goals, saying, “The S.D.G.s, it does sound like a sexually transmitted disease, doesn’t it?” • An expected drop in private jet traffic to Davos this year could be a sign that participants are taking the environmental impact of their travel more seriously. • Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old climate activist from Sweden, gave a speech urging the global elite to protect the planet. The best of the rest • Forum participants seemed receptive to Saudi Arabia’s damage control campaign over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. (Reuters) •The World Economic Forum hosts 3,000 official participants, but the population of Davos swells to 30,000 during the week. Here are the unaffiliated events, sessions and parties that drew celebrities like Matt Damon and Wyclef Jean. (CNBC) • The Bank of England is ready for Brexit and is disillusioned with Bitcoin, said its governor, Mark Carney. (Bloomberg) • Hundreds of protesters, some waving signs that read “Let them eat money,” complained that the elite participants at Davos cared more about the bottom line than about the state of the world. (AP)