Mason Facilities Adds 23 Bigbelly Zero Waste Stations

In alignment with the university’s commitment to reducing waste, Mason Facilities’ initiative to deploy 23 new Bigbelly zero waste stations on the Fairfax and Mason Square campuses will scale the waste collection benefits achieved at the Industrial Composting Pilot site. Launched in August 2022, the composting pilot installed Mason’s first ‘zero waste stations’ throughout the Starbucks Northern Neck building. The successful implementation of building-level composting access was funded through University Sustainability's Patriot Green Fund (PGF), funded by Mason Facilities, which previously funded a 2021 student-led project to assess recycling benefits from using Bigbelly Solar’s smart-waste management system at the outdoor patio location. 

By reducing the frequency of the Recycling and Housekeeping team’s waste collections, the installation of 23 additional Bigbelly Solar zero waste stations on the Fairfax and Mason Square campuses support staff members’ capacity to advance industrial composting at new drop-off locations.  

Five of the new Bigbelly Solar zero waste stations on the Fairfax Campus include industrial compost bins at key food patio sites. Like the Industrial Composting Pilot, the expanded Bigbelly Solar zero waste station initiative is part of a long-term strategy to improve our campus diversion rate (the amount of waste composted, recycled, repurposed, or otherwise diverted away from trash) by expanding composting access for all Mason students, faculty, and staff! 

The addition of the 23 Bigbelly stations was possible because of the success of the first Bigbelly station installed at the Industrial Composting Pilot’s site. 

The Industrial Composting Pilot’s goals included: 

• Testing zero waste design best practices at new ‘zero waste stations’ 
• Assessing Bigbelly Solar’s smart-waste management system and the impact of zero waste design standards on the reduction of compost contamination (items placed in the compost that are not compostable) 
• Collecting data to support industrial composting access for all Mason Patriots  

Thanks to our Facilities Management teams, Patriot Green Fund support, and the partnership of Mason’s Auxiliary Services and Dining teams, the composting pilot successfully installed zero waste bin upgrades at the Starbucks Northern Neck pilot site. Pilot bin upgrades created two ‘zero waste stations’, co-locating the university’s first public industrial compost bins. To co-locate compost, Mason Facilities Zone 6 and Recycling teams expanded the Bigbelly Solar waste and recycling station on the Starbucks patio by adding a compost bin and replacing waste and recycling bins inside the lobby with a new Max-R station.  

The Max-R zero waste station is made of approximately 1,655 reclaimed milk jugs – key to supporting post-consumer recycled (PCR) purchasing goals and guidance – and offered updated design features like waste stream co-location, restrictive lid openings, and color-coded messaging. To mirror design changes and composting access inside the building, the Starbucks patio’s Bigbelly Solar station was expanded to include a solar-powered waste compacting compost bin that could send bin fullness alerts to recycling staff in real-time. 

“Thanks to the daily efforts of Mason Dining and Facilities Recycling staff, Mason’s first site-wide composting pilot was able to consistently divert clean compost away from trash while informing best practices for adding composting access at future campus locations,” said Colleen Regan, Zero Waste Specialist on the University Sustainability team. “By successfully integrating composting with staff recycling processes, while supporting waste reduction improvements like replacing non-recyclable single-use plastics with better alternatives, their collaborative efforts improved the quality of both recycling and compost streams to divert more waste from incineration.”

To successfully divert food scraps and other third-party certified compostable items from Mason, the university must maintain a clean compost stream while it expands access at pilot locations. Pilot zero waste design changes were installed to support this essential waste contamination reduction goal. 

To benchmark the composting pilot’s progress toward this goal, weekly compost contamination audits were conducted throughout the pilot between September 2022 – February 2023. Volunteer compost contamination audits provided Facilities team members with crucial data to analyze the impact of the pilot. Zero waste data collected by volunteers complemented collections efficiency data recorded by the Bigbelly Solar station’s smart waste management system, which reports real-time waste data. The combined efforts of Facilities team members and audit volunteers informed the development of best practice procedures created in collaboration with Mason Dining staff members. 

"Bigbelly has a huge impact on our daily operations, the stations' technology makes us more efficient in performing our duties," said Kevin Brim, Recycling and Waste Management Supervisor within Facilities.  "Already, we’ve seen an immediate impact with both environmental challenges like wildlife, yellowjackets at the bin, wind-blown litter, and the operational challenge of keeping up with Mason's growth and overall university population day to day.”

The partnership with Mason Dining was crucial for the success of the Industrial Composting Pilot. Mason Dining staff quickly identified difficult-to-sort items, inventoried common contaminants identified during weekly audits, and piloted impactful behavioral and educational interventions to support appropriate waste disposal. When small plastic items, like single-use tea bag wrappers, were identified as a key contaminant, Mason Dining staff added countertop trash containers to co-locate disposal for this waste, despite space limitations behind the coffee counter.

By the end of the six-month pilot period, significant improvements from our pilot efforts were clear: 

• 1,000%+ increase in clean compost produced during the final month of the pilot in comparison to the first 
• 2,467 pounds of clean compost diverted from trash over the 6-month pilot period 
• 79% improvement in compost contamination over the 6-month period 
• 45% interior compost contamination rate during the first week 
• 3% interior compost contamination rate during the final week 
• 6% average monthly compost contamination rate, exceeding the local industrial composting facility’s maximum 10% standard for acceptance 

The Industrial Composting Pilot recorded a positive trend in contamination reduction and the data collection and assessment efforts supported: 

• Updates to the picture-based messaging and Spanish translations included in Facilities’ new standard waste bin labels 
• Mason Dining’s inclusion of composting guidance and training procedures in staff orientations 
• The expanded deployment of Bigbelly Solar zero waste stations on two campuses with financing from Mason’s Strategic Investment Fund (SIF)

With the success of Mason’s Industrial Composting pilot, which resulted in a deployment of 23 more Bigbelly stations with SIF funding, the Bigbelly Solar initiative aims to advance Mason’s zero waste goals, improve university waste diversion, and expand composting access. Bigbelly Solar zero waste stations now provide public composting access outside of 6 total Fairfax Campus locations and support Mason’s next actions to become a zero waste university: co-locating all waste and recycling bins and installing standardized bin messaging across our disposal locations. You can get involved in Mason’s zero waste pilots and initiatives by visiting our Zero Waste Mason page!  

New zero waste sites are always being added to the Sustainable Mason Map, check back to find locations and resources near you! 

Sort your compost, recycling, and trash at the bin using University Sustainability’s Zero Waste Mason resources.