Contributed by Alys Culhane
Have you ever thought about what becomes of recyclables tossed into the green barrels at the Alaska State Fair? If you are like me, perhaps limitedly. My curiosity was piqued in August 2017 after I was hired to be an early evening supervisor at the Alaska State Fair Recycling Area.
Working with other fair recycling staff, fair vendors, fair staff and hundreds of recycling volunteers, recyclables were collected and sorted in a mindful and expedient fashion, in preparation for further processing at the community recycling center, Valley Community for Recycling Solutions (VCRS).
I wrote dispatches, short vignettes, that were job and fair-related. I emailed my completed missives to VCRS, to be shared on their Facebook page and website (www.valleyrecycling.org), and also posted them on my website (www.alysculhane.com). I didn’t consider doing anything more with them, that is until one dispatch went viral. I was writing a first-person account about being stuck in fair traffic when I learned this, and right then, I decided to compile an e-book which would contain these dispatches and photographs. I foresaw that the perceptions of other “key players” would add a much-welcomed dimension to my personal account. This was most-fitting in that the fair theme was “Better Together”. The recycling effort at the fair had been taking place since 2002, and during this time, these key players had contributed to what is now a well-organized and highly successful recycling program.
This work-in-progress is entitled “If You Come to a Fork in the Road, Pick it Up”. The book title was a shared joke that became a truism. A year previously, VCRS employee, Carole Henry, and I were hanging out in the fair’s recycling area. I glanced down and saw a plastic fork to the left of my running shoe. “If you come to a fork in the road, pick it up,” I declared. This was apt because recyclables become part of what’s known as a waste stream, and along the way come to many literal forks in the road. I subsequently decided that part one of my book would be about what’s involved in collecting and sorting fair recyclables, and part two would be about what becomes of recyclables and non-recyclables.
I determined that even negligible amounts of recyclables follow a specific path. For instance, a minuscule amount of fair newsprint finds its way into the fair’s recycling area. However, what little there is heads on down the road. For instance, the first fork in the road for newsprint is VCRS, where it is baled and temporarily stored. The second fork in the road is Thermo-Kool of Alaska, a local business that buys and turns newsprint into insulation, stable bedding and mulch. The third fork in the road is Diamond H Ranch in Anchorage, where the newsprint serves as horse bedding. The resultant by-product (in this particular instance) is organic waste. The fourth fork in the road is Susitna Organics of Wasilla, where the organic waste is turned into compost, a soil amendment. And the fifth and final fork is a local garden plot.
I’m currently following like-roads for the larger volumes of fair cardboard, plastic bottles and aluminum cans, reuse of cooking oil and more. The majority of these roads end in the Lower 48; so this spring, I’ll travel to Washington and talk with brokers and end users. I hope to have the question, “What becomes of the Alaska State Fair recyclables?”, answered and in book form by fair time, August 2018.
About Alys Culhane:
Alys Culhane lives off-the-grid with her husband, Pete Praetorius, and their one dog, two chickens, two goats and four horses. Her area of writerly expertise is creative non-fiction, and her personal essays have appeared in numerous magazines and academic journals.
