UK wants to change 20,000 pounds of cardboard being thrown away each week

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ) – There’s a trashy display on UK’s campus people are talking about, which is a good thing. The school is using it to bring awareness to the importance of recycling.

Seventeen bales of cardboard are on display in front of UK’s library. It’s a representation of how much cardboard is being sent to landfills each week from the university, weighing more than 20 thousand pounds.

“It’s crazy to see that’s all we do here at UK, but like, collectively on other campuses or just around Lexington, it’s probably so much bigger than that,” said Carla Bravo, UK Student.

That is why UK recycling is partnering with the Office of sustainability. The goal is to increase recycling by 25% by 2022.

“If we can get those students, faculty, staff, anybody handling a box on campus to think twice, recycle that box, we could see our numbers double of what we recycle, specifically for cardboard on campus,” said Joanna Ashford, UK Recycling Coordinator.

Ashford encourages everyone to continue recycling while home for the holidays.

Essity, a Harrodsburg company, wants to debunk that all recycling ends up in the landfill anyway, so there’s no point. The company said that’s not true, and it can ultimately help the economy.

“In our business, that’s our raw material that we use,” said Nick Ruof, Essity Operations Manager. “We make toilet paper and paper towels.”

Ruof said 30 pounds of cardboard yields 1 case of paper towels.

“That way we don’t have to cut down another tree, we don’t have to burn another ton of coal,” said Ruof.

The cardboard display will be up through Thursday.