What: “Curb Your Carbon Footprint” Video Contest Awards Ceremony and Video Screening
When: Monday, November 15, 11 a.m.
Where: Indianapolis Art Center Basile Theatre, 820 E. 67th Street, Indianapolis

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PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Friday, November 12, 2010

For more information contact:

Carey Hamilton, 317-632-5915, [email protected]

“Curb Your Carbon Footprint” Video Contest Winners To Be Announced

Indiana middle and high school students were recently asked to create 30-second videos telling Hoosiers how they can curb their carbon footprints by recycling and more than 150 students met the challenge!

As a part of America Recycles Day (ARD), the Indiana Recycling Coalition (IRC) hosted its second annual video contest as a way to help Indiana middle and high school students develop a better understanding of why recycling is one of the easiest ways for individuals to reduce their carbon footprints. The IRC provided students with a list of reasons to recycle (see below) as a guide to help them come up with ideas.

“Students play an important role in influencing their families’ habits and they are particularly in tune with environmental issues, so they are a great emissary for recycling,” said IRC Executive Director Carey Hamilton. “We were thrilled to see so many students participate in this fun and educational project.”

Winners will be announced and winning videos will be screened next week on America Recycles Day.

What: “Curb Your Carbon Footprint” Video Contest Awards Ceremony & Video Screening

When: Monday, November 15, 11 a.m.

Where: Indianapolis Art Center Basile Theatre, 820 E. 67th Street, Indianapolis

The media is invited to attend the awards and screening.

Entries could be submitted by groups or individuals and were judged on creativity and advancement of the contest’s purpose. The IRC’s panel of judges chose first, second, and third place winners in the middle and high school categories, and a “viewers’ choice” winner was chosen based on the number of views on the YouTube website. Winning videos were created by students from the following schools:

- Creston Middle School, Indianapolis

- Greenfield Intermediate School, Greenfield

- Hamilton Southeastern High School, Fishers

- McKenzie Center for Innovation & Technology, Indianapolis

- University High School, Zionsville

- West Central Middle School, Francesville

The video contest was generously sponsored by the Indiana Household Hazardous Waste Taskforce, National Starch Food Innovation and Keramida.

Reasons to Recycle:

- Recycling Reduces Carbon Emissions. Raising the national recycling rate from 30 to 35% would reduce emissions by 10 million tons of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent).

- Recycling Saves Energy. Recycling 30% of US waste each year saves the energy equivalent of taking 25 million gasoline-powered cars off the road.

- Recycling Creates Jobs. Recycling in Indiana brings $19 billion in annual revenue and supports 75,000 jobs in 1,700 Hoosier businesses.

- Recycling is a Super-Size Solution. Recycling helps curb the over 40% of total US CO2e emissions tied to making, moving, and disposing of all kinds of stuff from food to furniture to everything else.

- Recycling Is Good For Our Environment. Recycling more means using fewer natural resources, keeping trash out of landfills, and protecting our climate!

- Recycling is Good for our Economy. Recycling helps American companies that use recyclable materials like glass and aluminum to cut their production costs, which can save consumers money!

- Recycling is DO-able! The average US household can reduce its carbon footprint by 574 lbs of CO2e annually just by recycling common items like tin soup cans, glass bottles, and plastic and aluminum beverage containers.

The mission of the IRC is to support source reduction, reuse, composting and recycling activities in Indiana. To encourage integrated recycling, the Coalition supports buying recycled-content products, and the collection and remanufacturing of recyclable materials. The goal of this support is to conserve our natural resources, decrease reliance on final disposal and to encourage environmental responsibility.

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