Did you know that you can recycle pens at the University of Ottawa? A few years ago, the Office of Campus Sustainability introduced Pen Recycling on campus as an expansion to the recycling program. There is only one problem... how can you get people to recycle something they don't know that they can recycle? Before we go too far down the rabbit hole, let's start with how pens can get recycled. It's actually really simple, we use Terra Cycle - a company that specializing in hard to recycle things. We use them on campus a lot actually. Coffee pods, cigarette butts, plastic gloves... even shoes from time to time. Terra Cycle has a team of people who disassemble things and recycle the components separately. No magic involved, just some elbow grease. The materials (like plastics) get transformed into new items like park benches. One of the programs they operate is pen recycling, which is currently free and is being covered by Staples Canada . So the first part is c...

The times they are a changing, and now so is recycling at uOttawa. This month you may have noticed that the signs on the recycling bins have changed. Simply put, the University of Ottawa has a new waste management contract and we have made some modifications and upgrades to the recycling system. Here is a complete run-down of the changes that affect you. Coffee cups are compostable One of the biggest changes to the recycling system is that you can now compost your coffee cups. As the compost system expands on campus, more and more disposable items on campus are being replaced with compostable ones. Take for example the compostable cutlery and carry away clam-shell containers available at most food service locations on campus. These items are more preferable to their conventional plastic counterparts. *Do remember though, coffee lids are not compostable and should be separated and placed in the trash bin. The only exception are the lids from Première Moisson, which are ...