Courtesy photo
‘Elements of EcoCentro’ will address solid waste reduction and other topics.
Kyle R. Cotton
sac-ranger@alamo.edu
Students for Environmental Awareness on Nov. 5 are hosting the first of a series of weekly presentations on the environmental work of a campus outreach center. The “Elements of EcoCentro” series, at 5 p.m. Wednesdays at EcoCentro, will begin with a presentation on solid waste reduction.
“We wanted to start with solid waste reduction because it’s already a big part of what we do here at EcoCentro, with community composting, battery recycling drives, etc.,” said Lisa Cervantes, SEA president and environmental science sophomore.
“We don’t want to rely on landfills to take care our waste,” she said.
Cervantes said the waste disposed of in landfills seeps into soil, forming previously unknown chemicals she described as “the juice.”
She said SEA wants to increase solid waste reduction now more than ever, with what Cervantes described as “mountains” of waste in landfills where beautiful spaces once were.
Tom J. McKissick, environmental science sophomore and vice president of SEA, said, “We have huge amounts of trash just developing in all these different areas of the world where it just kills off the environments by changing ecosystems.”
McKissick said, “Just the little bit of change in the pH levels can harm an entire ecosystem.”
“These changes in the environment can be accelerated by the different fertilizers that run off into the water supply,” he said.
The presentation will cover what is commonly referred to as the three R’s, reduce, reuse and recycle, as well as composting and vermicomposting.
For more information about Students for Environmental Awareness and “Elements of EcoCentro,” visit EcoCentro at 1802 N. Main Ave.
