School of Sustainability Graduate Culminating Experiences
Student capstone and applied projects from ASU's School of Sustainability.
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- All Subjects: Recycling
Description
While the term sustainability is commonly used in 2019, in 1950, it was sparsely uttered. To understand how Contento Recycling LLC became Central New York’s leader in sustainable development, you must go back to Gerald Contento Sr, and the year 1950. This was the year my grandfather started our family’s vehicle dismantling and scrap metal recycling business. Over the course of the next 70 years, Contento’s and now, Contento Recycling, has evolved into a leader in recycling and environmental work in Central New York. To see how I created a sustainable business enterprise, you must analyze my family’s past. My family’s history provides a roadmap to a more sustainable future.
When I established Contento Recycling LLC in 2017, it was poised to be Central New York’s first ever construction and demolition debris recycling business. I was tasked with the challenge that many sustainability professionals are tasked with and that was to show the community why they should stop taking their construction debris to the landfill, and instead bring it to my recycling center for processing, recycling, and landfill diversion. Over the last several years I applied for state grant funding, spread awareness about my new business, designed and constructed a material recovery facility, outfitted equipment, and trained staff. I now have a facility that accepts about 40 tons of mixed C&D debris per day, and diverts about 20% of that from the landfill.
On a more personal level, I learned a tremendous amount about dealing with change management. I’ve learned a lot about business development, and some keys to success when building a business. I’ve figured out how to help my employees and customers grow. I’ve learned to be more patient and flexible with my business endeavors. I have a much clearer vision of what I want for my business and for myself. I have developed a rousing optimism on the impact that my business, and myself can have on the sustainable development of Central New York. I will be a leader in environmental stewardship and partner with other people and organizations who want to work towards a more sustainable future.
When I established Contento Recycling LLC in 2017, it was poised to be Central New York’s first ever construction and demolition debris recycling business. I was tasked with the challenge that many sustainability professionals are tasked with and that was to show the community why they should stop taking their construction debris to the landfill, and instead bring it to my recycling center for processing, recycling, and landfill diversion. Over the last several years I applied for state grant funding, spread awareness about my new business, designed and constructed a material recovery facility, outfitted equipment, and trained staff. I now have a facility that accepts about 40 tons of mixed C&D debris per day, and diverts about 20% of that from the landfill.
On a more personal level, I learned a tremendous amount about dealing with change management. I’ve learned a lot about business development, and some keys to success when building a business. I’ve figured out how to help my employees and customers grow. I’ve learned to be more patient and flexible with my business endeavors. I have a much clearer vision of what I want for my business and for myself. I have developed a rousing optimism on the impact that my business, and myself can have on the sustainable development of Central New York. I will be a leader in environmental stewardship and partner with other people and organizations who want to work towards a more sustainable future.
ContributorsContento, Anthony (Author, Project director)
Created2019-05-15
Description
Waste management within the office represents a major sustainability problem for many corporations. Salt River Project (SRP) faces unique challenges at Coronado Generating Station (CGS) and the employee recreation facility Project Employee Recreation Facility (PERA). Addressing major waste streams at CGS involved shifting perspectives, adapting current infrastructure, and incorporating recycling into employee resources. Composting represented an easy to communicate and effective solution to minimizing waste at the newly remodeled PERA club, where the emphasis of the site is employee training, events, and catering. Employee engagement at both sites was based on the evidence based 6-step approach to implementing sustainable practices, including sparking initial engagement, forming working sustainability teams (Green Teams) and communicating effectively (Russo & Hoffman, 2008). These efforts helped bring sustainable initiatives and efforts to sites that are otherwise overlooked by SRP sustainability and employee engagement efforts. Further, these two sites modeled how sustainable change can be made in existing facilities as well as how sustainability can help model new facility infrastructure and marketing. The project was evaluated based on the Corporate Sustainability Management System framework in order to identify strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement.
ContributorsDoyle, Madison (Author, Project director)
Created2019-05-15
Description
This project explored the potential effectiveness of sustainable initiative programs in a typical office setting. The project area was focused on the Arizona offices of Expeditors International, a global, Fortune 500, third-party logistics company. The goal of the project was to set up recycling and composting services as well as create a culture of sustainability through educational materials distributed through various means to the employees. Throughout the project, it was discovered that there can be many barriers to effective implementation of sustainable initiatives, such as resistance to change. However, this project also highlighted that with a reasonable amount of effort and a strong logic behind the why, it it possible to shift the behaviors of normal office employees. This project also showed that using small improvements and occasional reminders of the value of being sustainable, behavior can be altered for the better. Despite the obstacles and challenges that are present in every office setting, this project has provided evidence that similar initiatives are very possible and can have a large impact for any company and for the planet.
ContributorsSponsler, James (Author) / Prosser, Paul (Contributor)
Created2017-11-20
Description
Abstract
A Case for Co-Ops (AC4CO) is a digital media outreach project that is intended to explore methods for increasing the impact of sustainability solutions, by helping to translate research implications into practical approaches for sustainable business design. The goal for this project is to increase public awareness regarding latent sustainability benefits offered by the proliferation of worker-owned social enterprises. In effort to achieve this goal, AC4CO pulls together a collection of information and resources regarding the design of worker-owned business models that implement social and environmental safeguards. This collated outreach material is hosted on a dedicated website, which decentralizes solutions by making educational material accessible to a diverse audience. Notably, AC4CO features edits from exclusive one-on-one interviews with leading academic scholars from the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU, who share their expert understanding of various sustainable business practices. Each expert offers insight into an integral piece within the constellation of considerations that are involved in the design of sustainable social enterprise models – from procurement policies to waste reduction strategies. Parallel to these interviews, AC4CO also showcases the design process for an emerging, sustainable worker cooperative, by highlighting the incubation of a local beverage business called Together We Brew. This incubation process was directed by fellow sustainability solutions graduate student, Nick Shivka, in collaboration with his ASU project partners, on behalf of their incubator program’s pilot cohort of worker-owner recruits. Weaving these aspects, AC4CO’s video components synthesize fundamental research-based knowledge of solution strategies into plainly spoken dialogue and augments the discussion with tangibility that is delivered through a visual narrative. This narrative lends plausibility to the task of designing business solution strategies, by providing viewers a look into the process as peers work together to figure out how to structure a cooperative business model that can present viable economic opportunity, while also promoting social equity and environmental protection. By stripping away scientific research jargon and simultaneously presenting a visual rendering of a theory of change, AC4CO’s approach frames the content of the video components in a way that enables an inclusive vision to be shared with a broad working-class audience. This method is intended to foster popular appeal, by distilling complex and varying issues into concise key points, while following a clear and coherent storytelling strategy for sustainability solutions. Functioning as a call to action, these video components serve a critical role in the overall digital media outreach project by piquing the curiosity of viewers and inspiring them to engage with the website to learn more. In doing so, the video components support the website’s central mission of providing a consolidated anthology of educational and resource tools, as a strategy for encouraging workers to join the movement by creating new sustainable and worker-owned social enterprises around the United States.
A Case for Co-Ops (AC4CO) is a digital media outreach project that is intended to explore methods for increasing the impact of sustainability solutions, by helping to translate research implications into practical approaches for sustainable business design. The goal for this project is to increase public awareness regarding latent sustainability benefits offered by the proliferation of worker-owned social enterprises. In effort to achieve this goal, AC4CO pulls together a collection of information and resources regarding the design of worker-owned business models that implement social and environmental safeguards. This collated outreach material is hosted on a dedicated website, which decentralizes solutions by making educational material accessible to a diverse audience. Notably, AC4CO features edits from exclusive one-on-one interviews with leading academic scholars from the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability at ASU, who share their expert understanding of various sustainable business practices. Each expert offers insight into an integral piece within the constellation of considerations that are involved in the design of sustainable social enterprise models – from procurement policies to waste reduction strategies. Parallel to these interviews, AC4CO also showcases the design process for an emerging, sustainable worker cooperative, by highlighting the incubation of a local beverage business called Together We Brew. This incubation process was directed by fellow sustainability solutions graduate student, Nick Shivka, in collaboration with his ASU project partners, on behalf of their incubator program’s pilot cohort of worker-owner recruits. Weaving these aspects, AC4CO’s video components synthesize fundamental research-based knowledge of solution strategies into plainly spoken dialogue and augments the discussion with tangibility that is delivered through a visual narrative. This narrative lends plausibility to the task of designing business solution strategies, by providing viewers a look into the process as peers work together to figure out how to structure a cooperative business model that can present viable economic opportunity, while also promoting social equity and environmental protection. By stripping away scientific research jargon and simultaneously presenting a visual rendering of a theory of change, AC4CO’s approach frames the content of the video components in a way that enables an inclusive vision to be shared with a broad working-class audience. This method is intended to foster popular appeal, by distilling complex and varying issues into concise key points, while following a clear and coherent storytelling strategy for sustainability solutions. Functioning as a call to action, these video components serve a critical role in the overall digital media outreach project by piquing the curiosity of viewers and inspiring them to engage with the website to learn more. In doing so, the video components support the website’s central mission of providing a consolidated anthology of educational and resource tools, as a strategy for encouraging workers to join the movement by creating new sustainable and worker-owned social enterprises around the United States.
ContributorsDarr, Charles (Writer of accompanying material)
Created2020-05-13