By Alyssa Figueroa and Sarah Readdean
In light of the growing discussion of sustainability initiatives on campus, sustainability@BU hosted a forum Wednesday where co-chairs of the recently formed Zero Waste Implementation Task Force sought to gain key insights from the BU community.
At the forum, attendees shared opinions, concerns and suggestions on how to make BU’s goal of zero waste by 2030 a reality. The task force was split into working groups for different areas of the issue.
Greg King, associate category manager for BU Sourcing and Procurement and co-chair of the Supply Chain working group, said in an interview after the forum he believes BU is in a position to be a leader in sustainability.
“We’re trying to set the tone for what everyone should be doing,” King said. “If we can establish that here, we can be the building block for the entire city.”
The forum began with an introduction to zero waste and an explanation of what BU is doing to accomplish it.
Kaity Robbins, zero waste manager for sustainability@BU and co-chair of the Engagement and Environmental Stewardship working group, said pursuing a zero waste goal is about finding ways to better use resources.
“Waste is just a valuable resource that’s in the wrong place,” Robbins said.
After the introduction, the forum broke out into discussion groups categorized by working groups: construction waste, supply chains, infrastructure and logistics, metrics, and engagement and environmental stewardship.
Some of the student ideas included creating an environmental stewardship unit for the BU HUB and implementing drop off sites for composting.
Ben Lague, a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences, offered the idea of educating people of the consequences of excessive waste during the group discussion. Lague said BU needs more than just posters about sustainability.
“I feel like it’s more of a feel-good kind of thing,” Lague said, “not a call to action.”
Lisa Tornatore, the sustainability director at BU and one of the primary organizers of the event, said although the goal of achieving zero waste by 2030 seems lofty, forums such as this one help to show that it is attainable with the help of the BU community.
“The intent with the forums is to bring the community in so that people can understand where we’re thinking we’re going to head,” Tornatore said. “But also to get some creative ideas on how to reach a zero-waste school for Boston University.”
Andrea Gomez-Watson, a freshman in CAS, noted that she walked out of this forum knowing more about sustainability and the zero waste initiative than she did when she first walked in.
“Coming here, I found that I did not really know what [zero waste] meant,” Watson said. “But this has been really enlightening, and I believe trying to achieve a zero waste campus is crucial for the future of our planet.”
Denise Hagen, a junior in the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies and director of Environmental Affairs at sustainability@BU, said while actions like saying no to a straw may seem small, they feed into a bigger effort.
“Seven billion people saying ‘one action doesn’t make a difference,’” Hagen said. “But that’s seven billion differences.”
Another forum will take place again at the BU Medical Campus Thursday evening.
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