Two years ago Al Matyasovsky’s boss at Penn State’s Office of Physical Plant asked him to find a way to turn the university into a zero-waste institution. Problem was, Matyasovsky couldn’t find a way to even measure just how much waste Penn State generated in the first place.
As is the case in many tales of discovery, the answer came to him in a dream.
“I sat up in bed and said the words, ‘Response diversion,’ ” recalls Matyasovsky, a supervisor in the physical plant department. He rose from bed at 1 a.m., wrote down his idea and took it to work the next day.
That revelation turned into the ReDi Index, a standardized way of measuring how much waste an institution generates and how much is kept out of a landfill. As Matyasovsky explains, the waste manager at a college, an airport or a city can enter information about the amount of trash thrown away and where it ends up. The index, which is supposed to launch soon, allows managers to compare their institutions with similar institutions nearby or around the world.
“Waste is waste, whether you’re in Baltimore or Beijing,” Matyasovsky says. “It’s the standard that will make everything equal.” Penn State has applied for a patent on the ReDi Index and people all over the world are interested in using it.
Each user will get a score on the ReDi Index. Penn State’s is 88/60 but will be higher when the index launches, Matyasovsky says. That means the college has a plan to keep 88 percent of waste out of a landfill and 60 percent is actually diverted.
Source: Al Matyasovsky, Penn State University
Writer: Rebecca VanderMeulen
