The Burger family (Chris and Cindy) of Whitney Point, NY, produce less than a bag of garbage together in a year (about 12 ounces of garbage per person per year). To put things in perspective, on the uOttawa campus, employees and students (grad + undergrad + international + employees = 45289*) create 2 385 402 pound of waste a year, which means on average the uOttawa population produces 52.7 pounds of waste every year and most students are only on campus eight months of the year. That said, the University of Ottawa operates over 18 waste diversion programs. For example, there is traditional paper recycling (about 28% of all recycling), metal and commercial glass products, and more recent ones like the all plastics recycling, YES ALL OF THEM . In recent years, uOttawa also entered the Recyclemania  challenge, initiated the Dump & Run program, as well as the furniture recycling program, which  has avoided costs of close to $500,000**. This is part of why the University ...

The community gardens are back... and just in time cause this snow is killing me. Sunday the community garden group got together for a garden work bee. Thanks to a compost delivery last Friday, there was plenty of work to do. A good part of the day was spent cleaning out old plots, trenching the existing plots, adding some compost, and finally.... gratuitous hi-fives. This marks the 8th consecutive year of community gardening on campus at the University of Ottawa with approximately 50 plots available to staff, students, and community members. Not bad considering the garden originally started out as a small group of 10 students sharing 4 plots. This year, like that last few years, the resources for the garden were provided by Physical Resources Service and the community organizing was provided by OPIRG . And like last year, the plots are open on a first come first serve basis and are free to all those who participate. I am really happy to see the gardens up and running thi...