Capilano University students audit their own waste

About 150 students at Capilano University will be donning overalls and sifting through a mountainous pile of garbage today to take part in the campus's annual waste audit.

"We have a great big dump truck that will drop onto tarp behind our sportsplex one day's waste, which is about 1,000 pounds of garbage and we'll go through it," director of facilities Susan Doig told The Early Edition's Rick Cluff.

Students will be looking for things that shouldn't be in the garbage like electronics, batteries, organic matter, and in some cases, construction waste.

"It's really insightful as to where we are as stewards of our waste," said Doig.

The waste audit started in 2011, and Doig said she's seen big changes since.

"The first year that we did it, we had 69 per cent organics, and our last audit we had 44 per cent," she said.

"It's going in the right direction. Our goal today is to discover that we have 25 per cent or less organics in the waste, and depending on what we find out from today, we'll set our target for next year."

To hear the full interview with Susan Doig, click the audio labelled: Capilano University students sift through trash.