Towards Zero Waste: SeaFeast's Sustainability Efforts
Bellingham SeaFeast is proud to partner with Sustainable Connections and Sanitary Service Company to make Bellingham SeaFeast a Towards Zero Waste (TZW) event. A Towards Zero Waste event means that our goal is to plan ahead and work with our vendors to distribute only materials that are recyclable or compostable (basically, don’t send anything to the landfill!). Part of our mission at SeaFeast is to celebrate the enjoyment and conservation of our water resources. By hosting a festival on our waterfront, we accept the responsibility to honor and protect it.
In 2017, SeaFeast only sent 1% of the total refuse to the landfill, while most festivals send over 55%! We require that all vendors help us reach our ultimate goal of 100% landfill diversion by distributing only recyclable or compostable serving and packaging materials. Then, with the support of our TZW partners, we strategically distribute different cans for landfill, compost, and recyclables throughout the festival. We deploy an awesome group of Green Team volunteers and host a waste sorting station in the popular SeaFeed at the Harbor Food Court.
Brandi, from Sustainable Connections, was hard at work all day helping our attendees make the right, responsible choices while sorting their disposables!
In 2019, we had the following TZW successes:
Through a Toward Zero Waste event partnership with Sustainable Connections and an effort to insure clean waste streams, SeaFeast successfully diverted 87% of waste by volume from the landfill!
“125% better than last year, able to dump all the Food Plus [compost] and recycling cleanly after your crew pulled a few little things out that morning. Great job!” - Terry from SSC
Thank you to all our vendors and attendees who enthusiastically jumped on board to shrink the waste from out festival. We learn new lessons each year and will continue to do our best as stewards of our waterfront!
