Sometimes zero waste means rooting through mountains of garbage at the GoPro Mountain Games in Vail
Amelia Kovacs/Courtesy photo
If you tried to throw something away this past weekend at the GoPro Mountain Games, something may have stood out to you: The trash cans lived inside tents. Standing alongside some of these tents were members of the Walking Mountains Science Center’s Zero Waste Team.
What may not have been obvious is this: Throughout the weekend, Zero Waste Team members staffing the 2023 Mountain Games spent dozens of hours sorting through mountains of waste.
By midday Sunday, the Mountain Games had clocked eighty thousand visits. That much traffic creates a lot of trash — or does it? The Vail Valley Foundation, the nonprofit organization that puts on the Mountain Games every year, cemented its long-term sustainability goals into a campaign called Protect Our Playground last year.
“We wanted to protect the lands that we all live, work, and play on, especially during the Mountain Games,” said Ross Leonhart, the Vail Valley Foundation’s marketing and multi-media manager. The Zero Waste Team, which has been sorting trash at the Mountain Games since 2017, is a large part of this effort.
“I think it allows people to feel less helpless and maybe feel more empowered to make a change, whether it’s waste, or studying sustainability, or driving, reducing their energy usage. Waste is one of the ways we can connect people the most to sustainability, just because it’s right there.” Amelia Kovacs, Sustainability Programs Coordinator at Walking Mountains Science Center.
Every year, the Zero Waste Team works to improve upon its diversion rate, or the percentage of waste going somewhere other than the landfill. In 2017, the team diverted 72 percent of overall waste to either compost or recycling. This year, the diversion rate was 84 percent, according to Emily Dennis, the Zero Waste Team lead. That means that 84 percent of what was thrown away at this weekend’s mountain games was saved from the landfill.
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For comparison, the 2021 diversion rate for Eagle County was 29 percent, which, while still above Colorado’s average diversion rate of 16 percent, measures far below that of the Mountain Games.
“I think many times, we’re very disconnected with the life cycle of many things that we do. Waste-wise, I think a lot of times we just chuck and throw, and then don’t think about it. Having someone standing in front of a trash can, and asking you where that goes, that’s a completely different process, where you can stop and reflect on what you’re doing and the impact that you have,” said Amelia Kovacs, manager of Walking Mountains Science Center’s Sustainability Internship and Materials Management Task Force.
Dennis, who led her team in sorting through trash from 6 p.m. until past midnight on Saturday and Sunday, named the activity as one of her highlights of the weekend.
“It’s messy, it’s smelly, it’s gross, but it’s so fun, and you can see that impact expand,” she said. “Everybody is actively playing a role, whether it’s sorting, whether it’s laying, whether it’s throwing everything in the correct dumpster, where it needs to go.”
Though the Zero Waste Team’s actions are most visible during the event, the process of reducing waste at the Mountain Games actually starts months earlier, when representatives from the Vail Valley Foundation and Walking Mountain Science Center begin meeting with event vendors about ensuring the sustainability of their wares.
“We’ve been working with them since end of December, early January to really figure out and nail down what’s going to be there,” Kovacs said.
For the Vail Valley Foundation, this process also means selecting partner organizations with similar values.
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“We had about one hundred vendors out there and almost every one of them has some kind of sustainability aspect to their company,” Leonhart said.
The Vail Valley Foundation’s Protect Our Playground’s initiatives extend beyond waste reduction. Those watching Pepi’s Face-Off this year may have noticed the lanes that structured the event’s course. In the past, Leonhart noted, the race has caused significant damage to the mountainside. The implementation of lanes that divide the slope into thirds, designating 10 minutes in each lane, has protected the terrain from runner-induced harm.
Protect Our Playgrounds will also be continuing its Day of Service after success in 2022.
“Last year, we did the river cleanup with the Eagle River Watershed Council, and we got volunteers, staff, some of the athletes came back out, and we cleaned up the portions of the river that we use for the Mountain Games,” Leonhart said. This year, the Vail Valley Foundation is partnering with Restore the Gore for the Protect Our Playground Day of Service, which will take place on June 24.
Walking Mountains’ Zero Waste Team is scheduled for a minimum of 115 days of events in Eagle County in 2023. The team is made up of a combination of full-time Walking Mountains Science Center employees, contract staff, and volunteers. Coming up, Zero Waste Team members will be found staffing Salute to the USA, Avon’s Fourth of July celebration, as well as the Eagle County Fair & Rodeo at the end of July.
Getting involved is easy — just email Dennis, who puts out a regular zero-waste newsletter listing upcoming events. Additionally, for those interested in taking a step toward sustainability, Walking Mountains has an Eagle County-specific Waste Wizard app, available on the web and in English and Spanish, making it easy to search for where to throw away an item that might not be trash.
Talking with attendees of the Mountain Games about the ease of recycling and composting is Kovacs’ favorite part of being a member of the Zero Waste Team.
“I think it allows people to feel less helpless and maybe feel more empowered to make a change, whether it’s waste, or studying sustainability, or driving, reducing their energy usage. Waste is one of the ways we can connect people the most to sustainability, just because it’s right there,” Kovacs said.
“It’s really important to understand where your waste goes. It’s not just being thrown away, it’s going to the landfill, it’s going to the recycling facility, it’s going to the compost facility,” Dennis said. Armed with this new information about where your waste is headed, Dennis requests that, next time you go to throw something away: “Think before you toss.”
