From donating excess food to food banks to buying restroom supplies in bulk, the entertainment industry has a wealth of waste reduction opportunities. Below is a sampling of the commitments and achievements of WasteWise partners in this industry. These types of activities also can help your company reduce waste and cut costs. For more information or to enroll your company in WasteWise, call 800 EPAWISE (372-9473) or visit our home page at [www.epa.gov/wastewise].

The cornerstone of WasteWise, waste prevention means using less material to do the same job, cutting waste before recycling. Regardless of industry sector, everyone can take advantage of general waste prevention goals, such as double-sided copying, packaging reduction, or switching to reusable supplies. Some WasteWise partners in the computer and electronics industry have gone beyond the basics and implemented activities that target industry-specific waste materials. The following is a sampling of these goals:

• Collect maps from guests upon exit and reuse.
• Donate old water-based paint to community antigraffiti efforts.
• Compost organic waste and use as landscaping material throughout grounds.
• Distribute excess prepared and perishable food from hotels and restaurants to local food banks.
• Give unused food scraps to farmers for hog feed.
• Standardize all food service containers to reduce excess stock.
• Purchase supplies for visitor restrooms in bulk to reduce packaging.
• Monitor production levels closely to prevent overproduction of titles and catalogs.
• Educate guests about waste prevention.
• Establish computerized system to track movie sets and allow for revamping and reusing of sets.
  

WasteWise partners commit to initiating, expanding, or improving company programs to collect recyclables. In some cases, companies add new materials to an existing program, or they increase effectiveness through activities such as employee education or community outreach. WasteWise partners in the entertainment industry have set these goals:

• Distribute “recycling kits” to overnight guests.
• Recycle golf cart batteries.
• Add more containers for glass and aluminum recycling throughout parks.

WasteWise partners commit to in-creasing the overall recycled content in the products they purchase. WasteWise partners that are manufacturers can either increase the percentage of postconsumer content in the products they make or increase the recycled content in the products they purchase. Buy-recycled activities of WasteWise partners in the entertainment industry include:

• Use fast food containers made from post-consumer office paper at theme parks.
• Pilot recycled-plastic park and picnic benches in camping areas.
• Use old theme park trash can liners in the manufacture of new liners.

• Celestial Harmonies
• Mission Ridge Mountain Corp.
• Mt. Bachelor Ski & Summer Resort
• Mount Vernon - Home of George Washington
• Nauticus - The National Maritime Center
• Sedgwick County Zoo
• The Walt Disney Company
• Walt Disney World Company

• The Walt Disney Company, located in Anaheim, California, donated 3 million pounds of food scraps to feed animals and recycled nearly 8 million pounds of various office, packaging, and yard waste materials in 1997. The company also spent $397,000 on recycled-content stationary supplies and packaging materials.
• Walt Disney World Company, located in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, donated more than 1 million pounds of recovered building materials and conserved more than 100,000 pounds of deli paper by switching to clay food baskets that do not require paper liners. The company also reused more than 1 million pounds of textiles through waste reduction initiatives such as donating cast costumes, reusing old cloth towels as rags, and reusing old sheets as pot holders.