Airing out our waste problem

By Hawksley Horner, Leon Kostovetski, Sam Christensen

Small ripples can make a wave. We live in Okotoks, Alberta which is part of the Bow

River watershed. Now while this is a broad area we mostly want to focus on one of the main

sources of education in Okotoks, the Foothills composite high school of fine arts. We have over

1500 people in this school (50% over capacity) making for quite the waste issue within the

school. Within this bustling school is a pretty prominent issue of waste. Our school is within the

Bow River watershed a 25,000 km² area containing around a million people. This watershed is

home to the rocky mountains as well as wondrous prairie land, located in southern Alberta and

contains major bodies of water such as the Bow River, Sheep River and Bow Lake. All of these

provide what water we get in this watershed. This region contains many elements of natural

beauty which is why we find it so important for us to preserve and improve.

3. Issue

Annually around the world, we produce around 2.01 billion tons of waste. Just one

person in one day produces almost a full kilogram of waste. One of these items are the paper

towels, and about 254 million tons of used paper towels end up in landfills every year, which

equates to about 8% of the world's waste. One of the concerns that rises up from the issue of

paper towels is that they are terrible for plants and animals. Paper towels contribute to

deforestation and when an animal consumes a paper towel that is thrown into landfills the

animal’s digestive system becomes obstructed. Not only this but the constant supply of paper

towel is fuelled by the forestry industry and is a cause for deforestation, through the constant

use of paper towels. This is fueling global warming through the destruction of forests causing a

lesser amount of oxygen. Another problem with paper towels is that it cannot be recycled like

other paper products simply because the fibres within it are too short to be reused and recycled.

So most of this waste is ending up in landfills in landfills and not just that quite a lot of it as well.

As much as 3000 tons of paper towel is put into a landfill a day. Now unlike a lot of our
common-use plastics, paper towels only take around a month to decompose in the environment,

but because of the non-oxygen-rich environment of a landfill, these paper towels are breaking

down and releasing methane. Which is one of the most potent greenhouse gases and a huge

producer of global warming. This is why the common use of paper towel is an issue.

Now how do we continue to provide the school while still allowing people to competently

dry off their hands? Now instead of the incredibly large amount of paper waste caused by paper

towel dispensers, we think that a good alternative to this would be a Dyson air hand dryer.

Specifically, the Airblade V. Now normal paper towel dispensers produce a ludicrous amount of

paper towels and not only are these paper towels bad for the environment but they also cost an

exorbitant amount of money. On average a paper towel dispenser can cost anywhere up to

900$ a year, whereas air dryers usually only cost 20$ to maintain and power throughout a year.

These are quality pieces of machinery that are fighting waste throughout the world. Now these

‘Dyson Airblade V” air dryers are a key component in tackling the paper waste problem

throughout our location, and we plan to make them a commonplace component in all of the

washrooms around the school. Now there are a few locations where paper towel dispensers are

needed such as trade classes, but in the circumstance of a washroom, these are the better bet.

Not only would this solution make for an environmentally friendly school but it would also ease

the workload for some of the janitorial staff around the school. This is why I think air dryers are

an adequate solution to our school's waste problem.

Scope of the project:

Currently, with the money we would have, the scope of our project only extends to our

school, but it could easily reach other schools as we encourage the environmentally friendly

alteration. However, despite the relatively small scale of our endeavors, it would have massive

effects on the waste in our landfills. Paper towels, even though recyclable, end up in our
landfills; taking up 8% of the waste in them alone. If we are able to reduce that amount through

greener actions and initiatives, it could have a large impact on the environment, starting in our

school and branching out from there. Less waste in landfills leads to less ground toxicity and

less toxicity in groundwater, too. This would have a substantial impact on agriculture, as less

water and ground toxicity would assist in the proper growth of crops in areas around landfills.

Our solution is also very simple to implement into our community, which would assist in its

seamless incorporation into the school environment. It does not require many moving parts or

modifications to the school, as well as not changing people's day to day in a significant way. To

conclude, the scope of our project is confined to our school and our community, and it would be

a simple, positive change. We plan to buy and incorporate 4 hand dryers

Positive Impact:

Our addition of hand dryers to ours and surrounding schools would have many huge

positive impacts on our community and people. To start simply, hand dryers would reduce paper

towel waste in our school which would help to keep the place cleaner, increasing the quality of

life, as living in a clean environment does. The annual cost of having a hand dryer is also a

meaningful amount lower than that of a paper towel dispenser and it is more environmentally

friendly in terms of energy use, too. However despite all this, the biggest impact of our solution

would be the decreased amount of paper towels being used and produced from our washrooms.

Even though they are recyclable, paper towels are still a massive section of our waste, and

slowing their use would have many positive effects on the environment. The waste from paper

towels ends up in landfills, which contribute to ground and groundwater toxicity, a pressing issue

for agriculture. When we reduce our purchasing of paper towels, we are also helping to stop the

deforestation that is required to make them. Altogether, hand dryers will have a very positive

impact, environmentally, fiscally and in personal well-being.

 Now this solution to our problem contributes to quite a few of the United Nations

Sustainable Development Goals. A few goals that are related to this solution include:

Responsible Consumption and Production, Climate action, Clean Water and Sanitation,

Sustainable Cities and Communities as well as good health and well-being. It relates to

responsible consumption and production by replacing paper towels with hand dryers, there's a

reduction in waste generated, leading to less waste consumption by our school. It contributes to

climate action because manufacturing and throwing out paper towels contribute to emissions

and deforestation through production. Using hand dryers reduces the amount of paper towels in

the landfill and therefore reduces the amount of methane production through biodegradation.

Life on land reducing paper waste can help protect ecosystems by decreasing deforestation and

minimizing pollution caused by paper waste. Sustainable Cities and Communities relates to our

solution because solutions like hand dryers in specifically our school contributes to creating

environmentally friendly spaces within our watershed by reducing waste generation. While good

health and well-being is not quite as direct to this issue as other goals, when implementing hand

dryers it can be simpler to use, and cause people to remember to clean and dry off their hands.

Overall, the introduction of our solution within the school aligns with the United nations

Sustainable Development goals and works towards the goal of sustainability.

Resources + budget:

The resource(s) required for this project is a Dyson Airblade V which is the actual dryer,

the cost of this air dryer $1250 which is quite costly but with a 10,000 dollar budget this project

can be affordable and we can even buy and replace multiple paper towel dispensers with the

blow dryers. The cost would be $1250 per air dryer, we need about 4 air dryers which the entire

cost equates to about $5000, this fits nicely into the $10,000 budget and gives plenty of room for

expenses of installation. If we wanted to expand this project to other schools and replace their
paper towel dispensers with blow dryers then we can set up fundraisers at those schools to

raise money so that we can afford to continue the replacements.

Conclusion:

The problem of wasted paper towels is predominantly ignored and unnoticed by most

people. It is a creeping issue that has flown under the radar, filling our landfills and cutting down

our forests. The fix could start with something as simple as implementing a few hand dryers into

our school, the Foothills Composite High School. Our solution is effective, low risk and helpful to

both people and the environment. We should be considered for the top ten as this is not just an

issue in our school, and it is highly possible that our actions inspire others to follow the same

path, taking it home from school and finding ways to eliminate the wasteful use of paper towels.
 What watershed do you live in? We live in the bow river watershed

How big is your watershed? 25,000 km² k

How many people live in it? around Is million people

What are the main sources of water? ie. rivers, lakes, aquifers, rainwater, glaciers...

The main sources of water are alpine glaciers, rivers, lakes,

What are the names of the major bodies of water? bow river, sheep river, bow lake

(crowfoot glacier)

Describe the land i.e. desert, rocky, mountains, prairies, hills, forests, swamps,

wetlands...

prairies, mountains to the west, rolling hills

What are the largest towns/cities? Calgary Okotoks Cochrane Canmore

Does your watershed cross provincial/state/national borders? If so, what borders?

It covers part of Alberta

Where does the water in your watershed come from? Where does it flow to?
 Water comes from the mountains and flow to rivers and lakes.

What are some of the main businesses in your watershed? ie. Agriculture,

Manufacturing, Oil & Gas, Recreation, Tourism...

Same main businesses are energy, agriculture, Corealry, manufacturing construction.

tourism

What are some of the opportunities to improve your watershed?

Describe some good things you see people doing to help the environment in your

watershed i.e. Schools recycling paper, community gardens, battery recycling program, highway

garbage pick-ups...

We do highway clean ups. bottle depots, naturalized areas of new development reducing

distance driven by residents, 100% of view construction is built to a green building standardi by

2050 enhance the ratio of energy generated or purchased from low-carbon, renewable sources.

Supporting low emission vehicles, cncouragirly non-automotive transportation

How do these things help the watershed either in Quantity or Quality?

Reducing driving distance helps to improve air quality as well as getting energy.

Describe the concerns you have about ie. Car oil washed down storm drains, litter on streets,

decreasing green grass areas, 20 minute showers...

-Altering natural drainage networks runoff and pollutant (non-point sources one of the

number -Stream land the one pollutants for bodies bank for the stream of erosionic caused by a

change of agriculture and others wise that changes

flow -Landfills filled with recyclable materials

How are these things harming the watershed either in Quantity or Quality?

-The groundwater is becoming polluted because of fertilizer"

- Lakes quality decreases through chemical runoffs harming aquatic life chemical

landfills causing ground toxicity

recyclable materials ending up in the landfill

One concern:

From the list above, LIST ONE CONCERN you would like to focus on.

recyclable materials in landfill

Identify a realistic solution to address the concern you circled using the following guide:

Think of something INNOVATIVE that you could accomplish in your watershed, or a concept

that exists, but could be done better.

Briefly describe your solution:

The problem we have located in our watershed is that recyclable paper towels are not actually

being recycled and are ending up in the landfill. Our solution is to implement hand dryers into

the School bathrooms to encourage students and teachers to use them instead.

Is your solution...CREATIVE and ACHIEVABLE?

How so?

Onr solution is very achievable because hand dryers are very common place in our town and it

is creative because it is not as imposing on people, and is a simple change that does not affect

people's lives drastically

Our solution would help agriculture, as leos waste in landfills leads to less ground toxicity and

less toxicity in the groundwater

It will take place at our school, FCHS, where we will add hand dryers to the Washrooms

In this case, we are under budget, but if time to install is longer or we want to go to other

schools, we would need additional funding. Money could come from the school for the labour

hours and the extra money could also we used for the upkeep per year (which to much lower

than paper tonel). If it's successful, we could go to other schools where funding would be

provided by them.