Do smart chutes and other methods to pass SAYT savings on to an individual make a difference? If they do, in what kind of buildings, and are they equally effective for all populations?. Does a display in the lobby showing waste generation and diversion rates lead to better performance?.Data and Feedback LoopsĬould communicating waste data to generators and staff affect behavior? Some research concludes that moving bins closer to an apartment improves diversion rates, but more data is needed. How do physical factors such as building height and convenience of central waste area, and operational factors such as level of staffing, affect these outcomes?.How do co-location, convenience and visibility of bins for separate waste streams affect diversion and contamination rates and operations costs? (See StuyTown case study.Layzer et al., “Municipal Curbside Compostables Collection: What Works and Why,” work product of the Urban Sustainability Assessment Project, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Urban Studies and Planning (2014), 25, link DSNY came to similar conclusions in its 2001 report “New York City Recycling in Context” (8/2001): 31, link. ← Researchers found that logistical challenges in multi-unit and high-rise buildings reduce diversion of recyclables and organics by an average of 11% (especially if there’s a chute for refuse but not other streams). The relative costs and benefits must be better understood: But trash chutes offer convenience, especially in high-rise buildings, and these cities have many fewer buildings with trash chutes than NYC does. Research indicates that locating bins for recyclables and trash in the same place increases diversion rates. Municipalities such as San Francisco and Milan are basing their decisions to close trash chutes on the logical inference that making organics disposal as convenient as trash disposal will increase diversion. Behavior Equal Convenience Location of Waste Streams The questions that follow related to behavior, operations and logistics and health illustrate the kinds of data that will be needed to develop and evaluate pilots and guide effective policy. Our overarching recommendation is to collect data that will allow evaluation of alternative procedures for reducing waste. There is little data on actual building-level waste generation rates, the correlation between behavior and waste diversion and contamination or the various impacts of different collection strategies.
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