Mohawk College recycling single-use masks
Face-coverings have been recycled into composite lumber, outdoor furniture and rubber pellets
Although the mask mandate has been lifted, disposable personal protective equipment (PPE) continues to litter Hamilton streets, campuses and public places.
The COVID-19 pandemic has generated over 87,000 tonnes of health-care waste, most of it coming from single-use masks, a World Health Organization report said.
Mohawk College has figured out a way to recycle one-time-use masks into composite lumber, outdoor furniture or rubber pellets. So far, the college has diverted more than 260,000 masks.
Allison Maxted, manager of the sustainability office at Mohawk, told The Spectator that the initiative to recycle masks was pitched by a student during the yearly sustainability campaign in 2021.
“As an institution that is committed to sustainability, we jumped on
the opportunity,” she said, placing zero-waste cardboard boxes around the campus and exits, and encouraging people to use them.
Maxted shared how frustrating it was to see used masks going in the garbage as the community focused on safety during the pandemic.
“We felt a responsibility to respond to that and do something about it,” Maxted said.
She added, “We know that the impact is limited in terms of all the waste that has been created on the
planet, but we’ve tried to do our part.”
Once the cardboard boxes are filled with used masks, they’re kept in quarantine for 72 hours before they get shipped to TerraCycle, a private company in New Jersey with which Mohawk has partnered, Maxted said.
The company then stores the boxes for another 72 hours before disassembling the masks.
The larger covering part of the masks — made of plastic — gets recycled into composite lumber or outdoor furniture, Maxted said. The elastic loops of the masks are turned into rubber pellets or rubberized playground surfaces, while the metal nose pieces are melted down for different metal products.
The pilot project, initially funded by Mohawk’s sustainability initiative fund, has spent more than $30,000 on mask recycling.
The funding is now covered by Mohawk’s COVID-19 expenses.
Maxted noted the college is going to continue the project and encourage people to dispose their used masks in the placed boxes.
McMaster University also partnered with a British Columbiabased company, Vitacore, to launch a recycling program for single-use masks in 2021. The institution has established ways to melt down masks, converting them into pellets, which can be used as plastic-reinforced concrete.
As an institution that is committed to sustainability, we jumped on the opportunity.
ALLISON MAXTED MOHAWK COLLEGE