STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Here's an amazing number. Every year, Americans throw away almost 1,800 pounds of trash per person - 1,800 pounds. Giving items a second life keeps some of that trash out of the landfill and reduces greenhouse gas emissions. For NPR's Climate Solutions Week, Ben Howell of our member station WGLT explains how a university in Illinois is teaching students recycling skills that will not go to waste. That's a really bad dad joke that somebody put on the page here. But let me assure you that a version of it will be recycled at the end of the story.
BEN HOWELL, BYLINE: Every school year at Illinois State University starts with the Front Yard FreeCycle. Hundreds of students wait for the event outside a church parking lot on campus. When it's her turn, senior Malia Bermijo raced to grab one of the hot ticket items.
MALIA BERMIJO: I was told be a jerk and run. So I sprinted as fast as I could straight to this futon.
HOWELL: And you sat down and you claimed it?
BERMIJO: Yeah, I sat down and I claimed it. Oh, we got pillows now, too.
HOWELL: Students pick from loosely organized piles of clothes, decor and storage bins. Junior Nayeli Wood says she can find items she otherwise could not afford.
NAYELI WOOD: It's nice because we're all broke here, college students. So I don't have to spend, like, an arm and a leg to get, like, new dishware and stuff if I can just grab it, if no one else is using it.
HOWELL: Of course, students like the free items. But Elizabeth Reed, the director of the Office of Sustainability, has something else at the top of her mind.
ELIZABETH REED: What better way than before they even start their first class to expose them to the idea of reuse and resource sharing?
HOWELL: The goal of the office is to make it easy for students to take action on issues they already care about in the environment.
REED: They want universities and workplaces and the organizations and companies that they're supporting to be advocates for sustainability. They're expecting that.
HOWELL: FreeCycle is an annual event. But efforts continue throughout the year at the Share Shop. It's located in a repurposed old house on campus.
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HOWELL: Garrett Smolen, a student worker, says it's like a free thrift shop.
GARRETT SMOLEN: There's everything from clothing to kitchen utensils to bedding. We have some wall decor, which is not for free.
HOWELL: Some students have made that mistake. Smolen is a senior conservation and biology major. He's worked for the office for a year helping with FreeCycle and managing the Share Shop. At first, it was just a job, he says. But now he wants to devote his career to environmental issues.
SMOLEN: If I didn't work at this office and I never found this community, I don't know if I'd have such a strong drive to work in sustainability and conservation.
HOWELL: That sense of community, it's an important part of creating real change, says Michael Brown. He's the director of the Ecology Action Center, a nearby environmental nonprofit.
MICHAEL BROWN: We need to make it easy so that everybody can participate and it's not a significant challenge or barrier to do so.
HOWELL: Brown calculated the impact of a single FreeCycle using ClearPath, a software that estimates carbon emissions based on the weight of waste diverted from a landfill. Landfills are a major source of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. He found one FreeCycle can cut about 27 metric tons of emissions. That's like taking six cars off the road for a year. The impact may seem small, but that's not the point, he says.
BROWN: All of these efforts are critical to just normalizing these kind of behaviors.
HOWELL: At the end of the school year, the cycle begins anew. As the spring semester ends, the Office of Sustainability parks moving trucks outside each dorm on campus. Students drop off items as they move out.
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HOWELL: Sophomore Crystal O'Connor dropped off dishware, clothes and a mattress pad.
CRYSTAL O'CONNOR: Didn't want to throw it away. Same thing with the bowl and the coat. Other people could use them.
HOWELL: Next school year will start again with the Front Yard FreeCycle because this campus knows sustainability skills are worth reusing.
For NPR News, I'm Ben Howell in Normal, Illinois.
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