The measures put in place in March to curb the spread of COVID-19 have changed how North Carolinians consume and dispose of waste. This is the fifth installment in a series examining how advocacy organizations, local governments and state agencies are adapting to these changes.

One day about five years ago, Paul Schernitzki of Maysville experienced an awakening of sorts while driving to work. The grass along the road he traveled all summer had just been mowed by roadworkers. It was as if a shaved beard exposed oozing sores.

“I was shocked how much litter there was,” Schernitzki said in a February podcast, recounting the reasons for founding his new educational anti-littering effort, The Litter Pirate. “It blew my mind.”

But safety measures related to COVID-19 have stalled The Litter Pirate’s work, along with other annual or seasonal roadside cleanups organized by the state Department of Transportation and numerous community volunteer groups.

“It just made it a lot worse when the COVID set in, but we were already having budget issues,” Kimberly Wheeless, NCDOT’s litter management program outreach coordinator, said about litter maintenance programs. “The only positive note due to the COVID is, in the beginning, more people were staying home, so there was less litter.”

Both of DOT’s annual spring and fall litter sweeps had to be canceled because of the virus, she said. Cleanups associated with the department’s Adopt-A-Highway program and Sponsor-A-Highway litter sweeps were also rescheduled or canceled.

But with more people hitting the highways as everything is opening up again, Wheeless added, roadside and parking lot litter now include the addition of masks and gloves. Cigarette butts and fast-food trash continue to be the main component of the garbage, along with plastic bags, straws and bottles, as well as aluminum cans and glass bottles.

During 2019, NCDOT spent $21,665,454 removing litter from 80,000 miles of state routes, according to state data.

To offset costs, the agency has programs such as Sponsor-A-Highway, which offers 1-mile segments of highway to businesses to sponsor in exchange for a fee to pay professional cleanup crews and a roadside sign advertising the business, and Adopt-A-Highway, which offers supplies to volunteer groups to pick up and bag litter on sections of road in their communities for DOT to collect.

Funding for most of the state prison crews that did cleanups in the past has been cut in recent years, although some local governments still use inmates to remove litter. Others pick up roadside litter as part of court-mandated community service.

With or without COVID-19 aggravating the issue, litter has been a costly and unsightly plague on North Carolina, from the coast to the mountains.

In 2019, the Sponsor-A-Highway program removed 577,035 pounds of litter, and Adopt-A-Highway picked up 1,020,870 pounds of roadside trash. Other volunteers reported a total of 77,115 pounds, and NCDOT contract litter maintenance removed 7,253,490 pounds. Also, there was a total of 3,154 litter charges issued with 983 convictions. Intentional litterers could face fines of $250 plus costs.

Keep American Beautiful, probably the most recognized anti-litter nonprofit group, has about 650 certified affiliates nationwide and about 30 in North Carolina.

The group began in 1953 when “a group of corporate, civic and environmental leaders gathered to unite the public and private sectors to foster a national cleanliness ethic,” according to a 2018 press release.

The famous “Crying Indian” public service announcement from 1971, depicting a supposed Native American man (who was actually an Italian-American) on horseback, looking at the polluted and littered environment in his midst. As the camera zooms into his face, a big tear welled from one eye onto his cheek.

But critics of the PSA, often cited as one of the most successful in advertising history, accuse Keep American Beautiful of using the campaign to blame consumers, rather than manufacturers, for the blight.

“Not only were they the very essence of what the counterculture was against, they were also staunchly opposed to many environmental initiatives,” Finis Dunaway, author of “Seeing Green: The Use and Abuse of American Environmental Images,” wrote in a Nov. 21, 2017, editorial in the Chicago Tribune.

Dunaway contended that the “Crying Indian” purposely deflected attention from responsibility for the environmental blight created by disposable packaging and container industries.

“That narrative is fundamentally untrue,” said Keep American Beautiful spokesman Noah Ullman.

Although most of the founding members of the group, initially called the “Keep Our Roadsides Clean Council,” included corporate representatives from, among others, the National Can Corp., American Petroleum Institute and Paper Cup and Container Institute, it also represented the National Council of State Garden Clubs and the National Parks Association.

Ullman cited the group’s 2019 impact report as evidence of the Keep American Beautiful’s value to communities: 11,911,783 hours volunteered; 218,056 acres cleaned or improved; 59,874 miles of trails and roadway picked up; 7,764 miles of shoreline cleaned and $304,952,284 of economic benefit to communities.

In addition to regular cleanups, other events, such as the “plogging” trash blast, which features a long implement that picks up litter, were also sponsored this year by Keep American Beautiful, but were delayed, canceled or held virtually.

“The scale we deliver is impressive,” Ullman said. “It seems obvious to us now, but people didn’t know about putting things in the bin.”

Micki Bozeman, executive director of Keep Brunswick County Beautiful, confirms that most of the affiliate’s varied tasks, including its litter index that assesses the volume of litter at different spots in the county, have been affected by COVID.

For whatever reason, she added, people seem to think nothing of throwing masks and gloves outside — out their vehicle window, or tossed aside after leaving a building.

“It’s everywhere, especially in the parking lots,” Bozeman said. “Which to me just blows my mind.”

Bozeman, who is also the county’s solid waste and recycling coordinator, said the Brunswick affiliate, working in the county for 18 years, focuses more on the rural areas that don’t receive the same attention as the beaches.

But the county places specially designed carts at beach areas, she said, that serve the purpose of a “big ashtray” to encourage people not to put out their cigarettes on the ground or in the sand.

Considering the unfortunate reality that people continue to litter, she said being affiliated with a well-known national organization like Keep America Beautiful encourages people to get involved in cleaning it up.

“I’ve never littered at all, and I’ve never understood at all why somebody throws something out the window,” Bozeman said. “I do think that it’s something good for communities to be part of the effort.”

Schernitzki, a 39-year-old K-12 teacher, was so appalled by the amount of litter he saw just commuting to work that he decided to clean the area himself. It turned out to be more than one person could handle.

“The thing is, if you drive around and notice litter on the side of the road,” he said in an interview, “it’s always way worse than you can see in a car.”

Even after connecting with Adopt-A-Highway and other volunteers, he said, picking up litter off the same roadways over and over again left him feeling jaded.

“There’s a road I drive on called Hibbs Road in Carteret County,” Schernitzki said. “The last time I picked that road, I filled 100 30-gallon bags in 2 miles.”

It soon became obvious, he said, that littering is a complex problem that needs a more comprehensive solution than some unpaid people cleaning up other people’s trash. Policymakers, law enforcers and lawmakers, religious and business leaders and many more representatives from the public and private sector, he said, need to be engaged.

“I see the problem as kind of a pie chart,” Schernitzki said. “I think volunteerism has a place, but it should have an equal share of the pie.”

As a science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, teacher at Roger Bell New Tech Academy in Havelock who does videography on the side, Schernitzki thought he’d start by teaching young people about the waste stream and responsible disposal.

“I think people are assuming that children are getting taught that in school, but they’re not,” he said.

Less than a year ago, Schernitzki, who transplanted to Eastern North Carolina from Seattle in 2015, founded The Litter Pirate, a tongue-in-cheek nod to his outsider status as well as his mission to crew a diverse force of young and old to conquer litter. His website includes links to humorous videos and informative podcasts to help the spoonfuls of litter education go down easy.

“The goal of The Litter Pirate is to do more than pick litter,” he said in the podcast. “It’s to fight littering, not just litter.”

On the Western corner of the state, Gary Chamberlain founded North Carolina Litter-Free Coalition for similar reasons.

Chamberlain, 73, landed in North Carolina from Arizona about four years ago after visiting the state during one of his frequent cross-country bicycle trips.

“Every state has a litter epidemic, there is no state that is immune to this,” he said in an interview. “It’s a problem that nobody seems to be able to get their arms around.”

Roadside litter has served as a sad and alarming illustration of the social crisis with drugs and alcohol abuse, Chamberlain said. He has found liquor and beer bottles, opened and unopened, as well as needles and pill bottles.

The coalition has a “Cash-4-Trash” program, funded by local businesses and residents, that pays people $100 to fill 10 33-gallon bags with litter and answer six litter-related questions.

“It makes it a win-win situation for everybody,” he said. “Businesses love this program because they’re rewarding people who are doing something for their community. And the people who need funding have a way now to earn some funding rather than … begging for money for doing nothing.”

Chamberlain, a Vietnam War veteran and retired pharmaceutical data collection consultant, said he sees littering as a personal responsibility and doesn’t blame NCDOT for the volume of litter on roadsides.

“You, who are aunts, uncles, parents, or whatever, you put that trash there,” he said about his message. “So don’t complain to the NCDOT when they don’t have the time, money or funding to pick up the crap you left on the highway.”

That idea has received the approval of Republican politicians in the state, but Chamberlain said that the insists that the coalition remain nonpartisan. And the coalition’s slogan urging people to “Honor God and His Creation,” is about appreciating the environment, not “pushing scripture,” he said.

No matter a person’s beliefs or background, he said, “there’s something in this for everybody” because everyone hates litter.

“We’re an army of one,” he said, “consisting of many.”

Chamberlain said he hopes that the NC Litter Coalition eventually will be able to expand statewide.

Changing a careless behavior like littering, he agrees, will be a long-term effort.

“It’s a complicated thing,” he said. “I guess to get down to the basic thing is we need to educate the youth in elementary and middle school because they’re going to become the ones that actually make a difference long term.

“In my lifetime, I’m never going to see anything even close to what would make me happy, because we’re so far behind the eight ball.”

The measures put in place in March to curb the spread of COVID-19 have changed how North Carolinians consume and dispose of waste. This is the fourth installment in a series examining how advocacy organizations, local governments and state agencies are adapting to these changes.

Debris that litters the coast has been a longstanding problem for marine life, and coordinators for University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Turtle Trash Collectors program, which previously offered in-person educational activities, have changed how they reach audiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Laura Sirak-Schaeffer, grants project coordinator and lead instructor for Turtle Trash Collectors, said in an interview that the program is an environmental education initiative funded by a grant from the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program.

Turtle Trash Collectors is a project through MarineQuest, the official marine science outreach program for UNCW,  Watson College of Education, and the Center for Marine Science to offer young people with opportunities to explore, discover and value our marine habitats.

The goal of the program is to educate youth about the impacts of marine debris and encourage behavioral changes that will reduce its generation in the future.

“This program combines both my love for sea turtles and my passion for public education. My favorite part of my job is knowing that we are making a lasting impact by teaching everyone how they can stop marine debris,” she said.

Sirak-Schaeffer explained that marine debris has major effects on all kinds of marine organisms, especially sea turtles, which can confuse plastic bags and balloons for jellyfish. The debris can end up in their system and can get stuck, making the turtle feel full so that they stop eating. Sea turtles also can swallow fishing hooks and get caught in fishing nets.

“Since sea turtles are endangered species, we need to find a way to protect them from the impacts of marine debris,” Sirak-Schaeffer said, adding ways to help include reduce using plastic and use reusable water bottles, coffee cups, grocery bags and food containers instead, pick up trash to make sure it doesn’t end up in the ocean and encourage others to help.

Turtle Trash Collectors launched earlier this year new citizen-science program to better understand how COVID-19 is affecting pollution and marine debris.  Volunteers are to pick an area to hold a cleanup, such as a neighborhood, park or beach, and hold three cleanups in the same area, once now, then again when quarantine restrictions are lifting, and once more when everything is reopened and back to normal. Participation information is on the website.

During each cleanup, volunteers are asked to keep track of what they collect using a data sheet and then report data so progress can be recorded.

Sue Kezios, director of Youth Programs and UNCW MarineQuest, is the principle investigator, or PI, for the NOAA grant that funds the Turtle Trash Collectors project.

Kezios said that there already was in place the Turtle Trash Collector badging program to encourage young people and their families to collect certain kinds of marine debris, single-use plastic items in particular.

“But during the early days of the pandemic I started to hear stories about how the environment seemed to be responding to the decrease in human impacts. People in the Indian province of Punjab being able to see the Himalayan mountains for the first time in many years due to a reduction in air pollution, Kezios said. “This got me thinking about litter and whether that was decreasing; and if so, what would we find during beach cleanups?”

Kezios continued that the idea to launch the citizen-science project grew out of this initial idea and the fact that they were starting to hear how kids were struggling with online learning and being quarantined at home.

“Our citizen-science project is a great way to get them outside, engaged in science and helping the environment. We asked them to do a trash survey of the immediate neighborhood surrounding their homes during the early weeks of the pandemic, then a follow up survey once their community started to open back up, and a final survey once the community is fully opened,” Kezios said. “Will the trash increase as people start to spend more time out of their homes? Unfortunately, the data so far seems to indicate this is happening.”

Sirak-Schaeffer said the idea for Turtle Trash Collectors was sparked in the summer of 2018.

She and Kezios were “brainstorming ideas for new outreach programs and thought ‘wouldn’t it be fun to show the impacts of marine debris by simulating a sea turtle necropsy?’ We ran with the idea, applied for a grant through the NOAA Marine Debris Program, and were pleased to receive funding. We spent many hours designing and sewing our life-like sea turtle models, officially implementing programs in schools as of January of 2019,” Sirak-Schaeffer said.

They’ve traveled more than 9,000 miles and reached nearly 12,000 students and 500 teachers in southeastern North Carolina since starting the program, she said. ““We also educated 3,800 kids and 3,000 adults at public programs, mostly at the Karen Beasley Sea Turtle Rescue and Rehabilitation Center and the North Carolina Aquarium at Fort Fisher last summer.”

Kezios said she searched for a life-size and realistic-looking model and found a green sea turtle stuffed-animal toy that was easy to adapt for a necropsy simulation.

“Fortunately, our team is pretty creative, and we have a number of skilled seamstresses. I gutted the stuffed-turtles and reinforced their side walls. Another team member used cross-stitch webbing to reinforce and apply Velcro to the removable plastron,” Kezios explained. “Then we set up an assembly line and started sewing organs – muscles and heart, esophagus, stomach, small and large intestines, then trachea and lungs. The most difficult part was making small resealable openings throughout the digestive tract so we could insert marine debris that a sea turtle might mistakenly ingest.”

This is the third grant Kezios has secured that focuses specifically on the problem of marine debris.

“I think anyone who has seen coverage of a whale or sea turtle starving to death because of the marine debris they’ve swallowed or struggling to swim and breathe because they are entangled by derelict fishing gear must feel some level of responsibility for the problem,” she said. “We all generate trash, the challenge is to reduce it as much as possible and to responsibly dispose of it in an environmentally appropriate manner. Educational programs like ours can help people recognize the small ways they can contribute to a solution for a huge problem like marine debris.”

Kezios said the success of Turtle Trash Collectors was built on a previous project, Traveling Through Trash, funded by a NOAA marine debris prevention grant.

The project involved visiting schools in rural communities throughout the region with life-size inflatable North Atlantic Right Whale classroom, during which time they formed relationships with many of the school systems in coastal and southeastern North Carolina.

“The kids attended a program inside the whale and learned about marine debris origins and impacts, as well as how they can help prevent it. The program was very successful, so we were encouraged to continue our efforts with a second grant that leveraged young people’s interest in sea turtles,” Kezios said.

The idea to create stuffed turtles to simulate a necropsy, or animal autopsy, was based on the Traveling Through Trash project.

“One of the lessons we utilized with the life-sized whale was a simulated necropsy. This was so large it could only be done as a group exercise.  So, we decided to focus on a different marine organism that was equally charismatic, also impacted by marine debris, and would allow for small group interactions. The sea turtle was a perfect fit,” Kezios said.

Sirak-Schaeffer explained that before the pandemic, “we would bring our model sea turtles to elementary schools in southeastern North Carolina and do a hands-on demonstration with third to fifth grade classes. Since that is not possible right now due to COVID-19, we have shifted to a fully virtual experience. We still do our simulated necropsy and help you learn about sea turtles and marine debris, but now we do it via Zoom or other online delivery platforms,” she said.

The free virtual Turtle Trash Collectors programs are hourlong sessions that features a simulated sea turtle dissection, learn how trash can get to the ocean, see how trash in the ocean can impact sea turtles and learn how to help stop marine debris, including how to become a Turtle Trash Collector. Dates are announced on Facebook for the virtual programs designed for third to fifth graders, though all ages are welcome. Younger audiences should attend with an adult if possible. The next virtual program is 11 a.m. Oct. 3. A private program for students, Scouts or network can be scheduled as well.

Since transitioning to virtual programs in March, “we have reached over 750 students, 100 adults, and an additional 300 participants. We are looking forward to a busy fall of virtual programs and would love for you to join in on the fun,” she said.

Kezios told Coastal Review Online that the team “has done a terrific job” pivoting the project to online delivery.

“They created resources that allow students to watch the virtual necropsy on the computer screen while still following along with a dissection guide and flip book. With NOAA’s permission, we’ve been able to expand our geographic delivery area and the team has provided programs to students around the country and even overseas in places like Austria and Uganda,” Kezios added.

To join the Turtle Trash Collector badge program designed for upper-elementary students in the southeastern part of the state, participants will need to sign up to receive a Turtle Trash Collector Handbook that helps identify what kinds of debris to collect for each badge, where to find it, and how to collect the debris safely. Participants will need to collect 20 debris items in each of these categories to earn badges: snack food wrappers and food packaging; drink items such as aluminum cans, plastic bottles, etc.; plastic straws; fast food containers and plastic utensils; and plastic bags.

The Turtle Trash Collectors program has helped young people who don’t live near the coast realize that land-based litter can still make its way into the ocean and harm marine organisms, Kezios said. “Marine debris is everyone’s problem and we encourage our students to choose to be part of the solution.”

The measures put in place in March to curb the spread of COVID-19 have changed how North Carolinians consume and dispose of waste. This is the third installment in a series examining how advocacy organizations, local governments and state agencies are adapting to these changes.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed how we consume, which is being reflected in the recycling and waste industry.

The Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Andrew Wheeler in a message encourages Americans to recycle materials from their households to recycle more and recycle right by keeping gloves, masks, other personal protective equipment out of recycling bins and off the ground. 

“Businesses that normally recycle large amounts of paper and cardboard aren’t able to do that right now. Because of this, household recycling is more essential than ever. We are all staying home and getting more deliveries in cardboard boxes and generating more material than normal, much of which can be recycled,” according to the EPA. “Recycled materials are key for everything from making new products to boxes to ship products and other essential supplies for the everyday needs of hospitals, grocery stores, pharmacies and American homes. There are critical needs for all raw materials in the manufacturing supply chain, especially paper and cardboard.”

One concern the state Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Environmental Assistance and Customer Service, or DEACS, has heard from local government and recycling hauler contacts is that contamination in the recycling stream has increased since March.

DEACS Recycling Business Development Specialist Sandy Skolochenko explained in a recent interview that varying factors have led to the contamination problem.

“It ties in to the use of more single-use plastic items and residents placing them in the recycling bin even though most of those items don’t belong. Other factors are more time spent at home and more material generated at the curb,” she said. “In some cases, people are simply using their recycling bin as an overflow trash container. Additionally, unfamiliar materials like gloves and masks are now commonplace in the home and I’m sure there is some ‘wishcycling’ happening with those materials.”

She explained that wishcycling, also known as aspirational recycling, “happens when you put something into the recycling bin without checking whether it’s actually recyclable.”

The division developed a social media campaign to address COVID-related residential waste to help educate the public about what can and can’t be recycled.

Skolochenko added that she’s heard anecdotally that the commercial waste stream has decreased more than 50% and on the residential side, the Solid Waste Association of America reports that volume has increased 20%.

Big picture, Skolochenko said, is that the waste and recycling stream has shifted during the pandemic from the commercial sector to the residential sector.

“Commercial facilities generate quite a bit of cardboard, so the availability of that material has decreased at a time when manufacturers really need it to make essential items like toilet paper, shipping boxes and packaging for food and medical supplies. So it’s very important that we keep our residential recycling programs intact to keep feeding recycled content into the supply chain,” she said.

Matt James is a DAECS industrial development specialist who focuses on recycling business development.

James also noted that the stream of recyclables that goes to material recovery facilities contains much more residential recyclables since the pandemic has forced more folks to stay home.

“As businesses have reduced their hours, the commercial stream of recycling has decreased. Usually, the commercial stream of recycling is higher value and less contaminated,” he said.

Residents can help reduce contaminating the recycling stream by recycling materials that are actually recyclable such as plastic bottles, tubs, jugs and jars, glass bottles, metal cans, paper and cardboard.

A recent survey from his office showed that 80% of the recycling collected in North Carolina went to a manufacturer in the southeast, about 7% of the tonnage went to states outside the southeast and 13% of North Carolina’s recyclables left the country to be recycled in another country, he said.

“The most common and troublesome contaminant in the recycling stream is still plastic bags. The plastic bags and film tangle up the recycling equipment at Material Recovery Facilities. If people want to recycle their grocery bags, they can take them back to the store, but they should not put them in their recycling cart,” he added.

As for beach towns, the trend he’s noticed is that residents demand recycling despite the struggles with the industry.

“Because coastal towns can be located further from some of the state’s material recovery facilities, towns sometimes have difficulty finding outlets for their materials. We’ve seen some coastal communities drop their recycling program only to bring it back after their residents demand that service. Our office has been working with recycling markets to find sustainable solutions for recycling on the coast,” he said.

Shanna Fullmer, public works director for Dare County, said that trash tonnage has gone up overall 7% since last summer, mostly residential trash versus commercial.

“Recycling has slowed due to departmental challenges along with the closure of private recycle company on Hatteras Island,” she said. The only beach town that unincorporated Dare County manages is Hatteras Island and the closure of private company has presented Dare County with overflow issues as well as contamination issues.

She reiterated that following instructions at recycle yards as to what materials go where is vital to keep the recycling stream uncontaminated. “Recycle only the basics — plastic, glass, cardboard, aluminum cans, steel cans, paper. Many items people want to recycle simply are not recyclable in this area due to lack of markets.”

One beach town that has figured out a way to bring recycling back to its residents is Southern Shores.

Town manager Cliff Ogburn explained that because of changes in the market, Bay Disposal, which hauls the town’s recycling, had been taking the material to an incinerator.

“We are pleased to have worked with Bay to find a way to get back to recycling,” he said in an interview in late August. The town council amended the contract with Bay Disposal Aug. 18 and will now be hauling the recycling, including glass, to Recycling & Disposal Solutions of Virginia, or RDS, in Portsmouth.

Bay Disposal notified the town in December 2019 that the company no longer had a place to deliver collected materials. Since then, Bay has been taking the town’s recycling material to a waste-to-energy facility also in Portsmouth, Virginia.

Bay Disposal cannot place any noncontaminated recycling material in a landfill. The change adds $5,701 to the original annual contract amount of $189,500. The town said it serves about 2,800 homes as part of its recycling contract, according to the town.

Across the board, Ogburn said that while he hasn’t noticed an increase in littering, there is more residential trash and recycling than in years past, “Which makes sense due to more people staying home.  It’s also reflected in that trash and recycling costs have increased due to the increased volume.”

Joe Benedetto III, president of RDS Virginia, said he’s looking forward to working with Southern Shores to find creative solutions to the challenges that recycling has, especially with the challenges that COVID-19 has brought.

He explained that RDS is a smaller processor that focuses mostly on recycling, and serves about two dozen local governments in parts of Virginia and is trying to expand to the Outer Banks. He said they take in about 50,000 tons of recycling and about 20,000 tons of trash.

Benedetto said that recycling and the recycling markets have struggled recently with China being out of the recycling market in the Unites States for the last three years — that’s what led to the closure of a lot of recycling facilities. It pushed a lot of the cost structure back toward municipalities. China no longer buying recycling materials contributed to the demise of a lot of recycling programs, especially those on the Outer Banks.

RDS Virginia has been in talks with the state to set up a small facility somewhere closer to the Outer Banks to save on some of the transportation costs, and set up a small operation to do processing.

“The challenge with the Outer Banks is the location and the fact that there really isn’t a dedicated recycling center in that area. And, and that’s partly because of location and partly because of volume,” he said.

His company, having gone through the lack of demand and market, was able “to adjust a little bit over the past few years so that’s at least one big burden that’s been off our shoulders.”

Since March, Benedetto said that because of all the shutdowns, volume on types of paper from commercial and industrial has dramatically decreased and there has been an increase in the material coming out of the households, which makes sense because people are staying at home.

The mixed materials they’re seeing come out of households changed, too. The biggest change is the additional cardboard, which he contributes to the “Amazon effect,” as well as single serve products, tin cans and aluminum cans.

Among the single-serve products he’s noticed an increase in is single-serve plastics, like water bottles, but he said he hasn’t noticed an increase in plastic cutlery.

“It just kind of reflects the shifting of people from an office building to a home,” Benedetto said, and the shift from buying at a store to ordering online and having delivery to your house.

“We have also seen a higher percentage of contamination,” Benedetto said.

He speculated that could be because there’s folks who may not have been actively recycling in the past and are not quite sure what to recycle. He said there have been some gloves and masks but “things like plastic bags and such seem to be a little more prevalent,” he said.

One way he hopes to help lessen contamination in the recycling stream is to put out printed magnets explaining what to distribute to residents. ‘Education is always, in my opinion, the thing that we need to do and continue to do to reduce contamination and improve recycling rates.”

Local and state observations are in line with a recent survey by the Environmental Research & Education Foundation and the National Waste & Recycling Association on how the industry has been affected and how it has dealt with COVID-19 challenges.

The organizations received about 400 responses, mostly from waste haulers, as well as consulting firms, municipalities, government agencies and academic institutions, all of which reported being impacted by the pandemic.

Results indicate that academic institutions were among the most impacted, with government agencies and waste haulers reporting around 90%.

“About 6 out of 10 of haulers/waste managers experienced a decrease in volumes, while nearly 3 in 10 actually managed more material and the remainder were unchanged. This reflects the decline in commercial waste from the closure of offices, retail spaces and restaurants contrasted by the increase in residential waste from being quarantined. Unfortunately, increased volumes do not necessarily translate to attendant rise in revenue as many residential contracts are fixed price,” according to the EREF.

Additionally, close to 70% respondents noted that residential waste was the largest increase, with the remaining consisting of food, yard, commercial, medical, construction and demolition and industrial waste, in that order, while 67% observed a decrease in commercial waste.

Some respondents indicated that there have been changes to recycling, with some being sent directly to the landfill or minimal sorting is taking place, some stopped manual sorting, and others allowed all recyclables to be mixed, stopping all sorting. There were a few instances where recycling was stopped completely.

Respondents observed a decrease in medical waste rather than an increase.

“Anecdotal observations via discussions with medical personnel suggest that while localized COVID-19 ‘hotspots’ could result in increased medical waste volumes, the majority of the U.S. has seen reductions in medical waste,” according to EREF. “Healthcare workers suggest this could be due to a large portion of the population working at home, which may impact the frequency of situations requiring medical care. Elective surgeries were canceled and telehealth services have increased. Many doctors and dentists closed their offices to routine care and are only now beginning to reopen. In addition, COVID-19 patients do not generate significant amounts of medical waste.”

Despite the changes in volume for the different streams, 83% indicated they’re not handling any waste differently.

The Solid Waste Association of America, or SWANA, submitted in July a written statement to the U.S. Senate Committee of Environment and Public Works about the challenges facing recycling in the United States.

The statement is in conjunction with the Committee’s oversight hearing, “Responding to the Challenges Facing Recycling in the United States,” according to SWANA.

SWANA notes in the statement the impact that the COVID-19 pandemic is having on recycling programs and facilities, similar to those being reported by other organizations. There has been a decrease in recovered material from commercial customers such as schools, offices, and stores, meanwhile residential waste and recycling volume increased nationwide in March and April, though it has declined from the peak of about 20% higher than normal, according to SWANA.

SWANA also pointed to operational changes at recycling facilities to keep workers safe, temporary suspension of some curbside collection programs, and additional personal protective equipment provided by employers in response to concerns about exposure expressed by front-line workers.

The measures put in place in March to curb the spread of COVID-19 have changed how North Carolinians consume and dispose of waste. This is the second installment in a series examining how advocacy organizations, local governments and state agencies are adapting to these changes.

Environmental organizations along the coast, which are having to adapt to precautions to slow the spread of COVID-19, are noticing more coronavirus-related litter, from gloves and masks to takeout packaging, which can become hazardous marine debris.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, recommends that everyone wear cloth face coverings when leaving their homes, and many use single-use personal protective equipment, like gloves, wipes and disposable masks.

Another federal agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, Marine Debris Program warns that improperly disposing of personal protective equipment can create marine debris and harm the environment.

“Improperly discarded PPE can enter the environment through ineffective or improper waste management, intentional or accidental dumping and littering, or through stormwater runoff. Even if you’re at home, hundreds of miles from the shore, our trash travels and can adversely affect the ocean and harm the wildlife that share our planet,” the blog states.

Judith Enck is president of Beyond Plastics, a nationwide project to end plastic pollution. During a recent webinar, “Plastics Policy in the Age of COVID,” she explained that the World Health Organization estimates that 89 million masks are needed every month worldwide to deal with COVID-19. The disposable masks are mostly made from plastics, polypropylene, polyurethane, polyester and other polymers.

“These masks and gloves are already showing up in water bodies. There have been litter surveys in Hong Kong, Nigeria and France. An organization called Oceans Asia went to a remote beach just 11 meters (36 feet) long and found 70 masks,” Enck said. “The next week they found 30 on a remote beach. So one option is to use reusables, whenever possible. That certainly may not be possible with gloves and all the masks, although, nonmedical professionals like me can use reusable masks. I’ve been using one since the beginning of the pandemic.”

In addition to her role with Beyond Plastics, which is based at Bennington College in Vermont where she teaches, Enck is a former Environmental Protection Agency regional administrator appointed by President Obama.

“And now we have a new universe of plastic waste that needs attention: masks and gloves. Let me be clear, everyone should wear a mask in public, but no one should litter the mask. And no one should put the mask or the gloves in their recycling bin because they’re not recyclable,” she said.

“We most certainly have seen an increase in COVID-19-related litter,” said Dee Smith, Carteret Big Sweep coordinator. “I have seen numerous masks and gloves, especially roadsides and parking lots.”

​Carteret Big Sweep is the county’s effort to educate the public on litter and encourages and coordinates year-round cleanups.

Smith said another concerning item is the grocery cart wipes.

“I have seen them all over roads and parking lots as well as sidewalks and just on the floor in stores.  It is like people can’t find a trash can and they just leave them in the buggy and then it gets outside and the wind transports it,” she said.

Carteret Big Sweep has really had to adapt since COVID-19, Smith said.

“We have not stopped our efforts, we just evolved. We have individuals and families cleaning most of the major beach accesses on Bogue Banks every night,” she said.

Big Sweep has had a difficult time recruiting volunteers due to the COVID- 19 pandemic.  The summer solo cleanups were geared toward students needing to complete volunteer hours. The students were asked to commit a minimum of 25 volunteer hours by Labor Day Weekend. The students were assigned sections of busy beaches to clean during the solo effort that provides the needed social distancing, but allows for cleanup actions to continue.

As of mid-August, Smith said there were 137 documented solo cleanups on Bogue Banks.

“It is well over 2,000 pounds of debris. They are finding everything from food and beverage items to shoes, sunglasses and toys. Some notes left in the comments include lots of cigarette butts and the amount of plastic.  People also mentioned they saw an increase in masks with an increase of people,” she said.

Solo and family efforts brought in more than 2,103 pounds of debris over the course of 130 hours cleaning.

Smith said that she is recruiting small groups, families and individuals for the Ocean Conservancy’s 35^th International Coastal Cleanup or ICC, Sept. 19. “We already have a few interested groups. We will follow all of the governor’s restrictions.”

The cleanup is the world’s largest volunteer effort to remove and record trash from local lakes, waterways, beaches and the ocean, according to a recent release from Big Sweep.

“Whether engaging in this year’s ICC from home, or safely throughout the County, you are playing a critical role helping to keep plastics out of our ocean and waterways,” Smith said. “Although traditional, large group cleanups are not possible this year, ocean plastic pollution isn’t going away. It’s wonderful to see people taking action where they can.”

Ocean Conservancy will release a series of online resources to help think creatively about reducing everyday waste footprint, or conduct a small, safe cleanup.

“The International Coastal Cleanup remains one of the most effective ways for individuals to make an immediate, tangible impact for our ocean,” said Allison Schutes, Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup director, in a statement. “The ICC will certainly look a little different this year, but the ocean still needs us. Luckily, there is still plenty we can do to help stem the tide of ocean plastic pollution. We are so grateful for the efforts of Carteret Big Sweep and all the Carteret County volunteers in helping us achieve our shared vision for a cleaner, healthier ocean.”

Carteret Big Sweep cleanup volunteers can log the trash they collect in Ocean Conservancy’s Clean Swell app on their mobile phone. Scientists, researchers, industry leaders and policymakers use the index to inform policy and determine solutions to the growing marine debris crisis.

“Every year, millions of tons of trash, including an estimated 11 million metric tons of plastic waste, flows into the ocean, impacting more than 800 marine species and entering the food chain, the release from Big sweep. “Over the last 34 years of the ICC, 16.4 million volunteers have joined cleanup efforts big and small to remove 344 million pounds (156 million kilograms) of trash from beaches and waterways worldwide.”

In 2019, Carteret Big Sweep volunteers collected and recorded 15,051 pounds of trash from Carteret County, mostly cigarette butts and plastics.

Contact Smith at dee_edwards-smith@ncsu.edu to join the effort.

Surfrider Foundation, Outer Banks Chapter, is not hosting group cleanups or in-person events but is encouraging volunteers to grab a reusable bag or container to collect litter in their neighborhood or on the beach, document the findings by taking a picture or video and tagging the organization on Instagram, @surfrider_obx, with the hashtag #solobeachcleanup.

Bonnie Monteleone, executive director for Plastic Ocean Project based in Wilmington, said recently how surprised she was to see how many masks and gloves the volunteers picked since beginning April 22 for Earth Day. Plastic Ocean Project is a nonprofit organization conducting education through research, outreach through art, and solutions through collaboration.

“Our plan for 2020 was to do monthly cleanups for Route 421, mostly because so much debris ends up on the side of the road from trucks headed to the landfill,” she said.

“We had two cleanups before COVID. Pre-COVID cleanups, we did not find gloves and masks. When we started up again June 14, we found over 20 gloves and eight masks that day and find them every time we conduct cleanups,” Monteleone said.

“I think the more people use reusable masks, the less likely they get lost in the environment. In fact, 99% of the masks we find are the disposable kind,” she explained.

Leslie Vegas, coastal specialist with the North Carolina Coastal Federation’s northeast office in Wanchese, told Coastal Review Online that there’s been a noticeable increase in debris on the beaches and shorelines.

“Restaurants have been advised to use single-use (plastics) whenever possible, so businesses that have typically never used single-use plastics are using them now as a safety precaution. Takeout has also increased, so there have been far more plastic bags and clamshell containers in garbage bins, which we’ve also noticed have been overflowing more regularly,” Vegas explained. “Our local public waste staff noted that they are understaffed due to the virus, but have never seen so much trash here when they do their pickups. All in all, there’s a rise.”

Jan Farmer, a volunteer with the Topsail-area Ocean Friendly Establishments, said that from a trash perspective, she’s not seeing a noticeable increase in takeout containers, cups, food wrappers on the beach or along the road. “I still see and pick up plenty of those items, but not more than in previous summers.”

Ocean Friendly Establishments, which the Wilmington-based nonprofit Plastic Ocean Project launched in 2016, are businesses that voluntarily make environmentally friendly decisions, primarily reducing the use of single-use plastics by only serving straws upon request and eliminating single-use plastic bags and Styrofoam, and become certified through the program.

Katie Trout, marketing manager with the North Carolina Department of Transportation, said that the Roadside Environmental Unit staff, which oversees the Adopt-A-Highway program, has seen a decrease in reported pickups since the onset of COVID-19.

“Our spring 2020 sweep had to be canceled, which affected a huge amount of litter not being picked up,” Trout said.

“We have received some complaints from the public about masks and gloves being thrown down everywhere,” she added. “Adopt-A-Highway pickup reports are a bit slower than we typically see in the summer time. We should probably take into account the weather and temperature at this time, along with the COVID crisis.”

NOAA recommends another way to make a difference and reduce the impacts of all types of marine debris, including plastics, is to encourage others to properly disposing of trash and personal protective equipment and use the Marine Debris Tracker App to keep track of the debris including personal protective equipment.

The app is an initiative between the NOAA Marine Debris Program and the Southeast Atlantic Marine Debris Initiative, operated out of the University of Georgia College of Engineering, provides a way to log trash found on coastlines and waterways. The app records the debris location through GPS, and allows for adding the descriptions of items, attach photos of debris items and view the data on your phone.

Sara Hallas, coastal education coordinator for the Coastal Federation’s northeast office, said that the staff hasn’t been scheduling cleanups, as in the past, but is instead encouraging volunteers to have cleanups on their own and track their trash with the NOAA app.

“In the northeast we’ve been working safely in small groups outside to clean up some trouble areas that needed it, as well as arranging to loan cleanup supplies to groups who may like to organize efforts on their own,” she said. “For example, a Boy Scout was looking for a community service project. So I arranged a time to loan some cleanup supplies and advised him on a site that needed work, and he did the rest to coordinate with the group and lead the actual cleanup itself.”

The measures put in place in March to curb the spread of COVID-19 have changed how North Carolinians consume and dispose of waste. This is the first installment in a series examining how advocacy organizations, local governments and state agencies are adapting to these changes.

In recent years, a program to encourage restaurants and other businesses to use environmentally friendly practices has gained momentum along the North Carolina coast.

But organizers of the Ocean Friendly Establishments program are seeing their efforts come to a halt because of the COVID-19 pandemic, as more restaurants are being pushed to use single-use plastics.

Ocean Friendly Establishments, which the Wilmington-based nonprofit Plastic Ocean Project launched in 2016, are businesses that voluntarily make environmentally friendly decisions, primarily reducing the use of single-use plastics by only serving straws upon request and eliminating single-use plastic bags and Styrofoam, and become certified through the program.

Partners in the effort include the North Carolina Aquariums at Jennette’s Pier, Crystal Coast Waterkeeper, the North Carolina Coastal Federation and Surfrider Foundation.

Gov. Roy Cooper in March signed an executive order to close restaurants and bars to sit-down service, limiting the businesses to takeout or delivery orders only, to slow the spread of COVID-19. As a result, Ocean Friendly Establishment volunteers and businesses have noticed an uptick in use of single-serve plastics.

“With the increase in takeout business, we’ve really gone through a lot more disposable plastic ware,” Cara Godwin, assistant general manager for Blue Moon Beach Grill and Blue Water Grill, both in Nags Head, told Coastal Review Online. The restaurants are certified Ocean Friendly Establishments.

“That’s probably the biggest increase, along with plastic ramekins for ketchup and sauces for take-out. Other than that, we’ve tried to maintain our in-house operations as consistent and ‘plastic-free’ as usual. We do go through more disposable gloves.”

She added that with the lack of employees and COVID-19, “I think all of the restaurants are just trying to survive this crisis.”

Leslie Vegas, coastal specialist with the federation’s northeast office in Wanchese, began working with the Plastic Ocean Project in 2019 to expand the number of certified Ocean Friendly Establishments on the Outer Banks.

During a recent webinar, “Addressing Marine Debris in This New Norm,” Vegas explained that there are 52 businesses certified in the Outer Banks. From 2015-2018, an average of six businesses were certified a year and in 2019, when the federation and Jennette’s Pier joined the effort, 20 businesses were certified. “We saw a lot of growth last year.”

In 2020, only eight businesses were certified before March. Since then, just a handful of businesses have been certified as Ocean Friendly Establishments.

“The program has definitely lost a lot of momentum with the coronavirus happening,” Vegas said. “Restaurants have been the most affected, I think, by the virus in terms of the safety standards and sanitation standards that they have to uphold.”

Many single-use bans had been going into effect pre-COVID-19 across the country but many of those bans were postponed or eliminated completely, Vegas continued. “That’s another thing that we’ve had to sort of look at and consider as we’ve moved forward.”

The Ocean Friendly Establishments coordinators also learned more of what is required of restaurants and businesses from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and what the general guidelines would be.

The top three CDC recommendations and guidelines that most impacted the Ocean Friendly Establishments program were to avoid using or sharing items that are reusable, including menus, condiments and other food containers; use disposable food service items like utensils, dishes and tablecloths; and avoid using food and beverage utensils and containers brought by customers, she said.

“This is straight from the CDC. They’re really encouraging the usage of disposable items to be safe. However, they say that if the items are not feasible or desirable, ensure that they are cleansed and handled properly,” Vegas said.

In addition to encouraging businesses to reduce single-use plastic, Ocean Friendly Establishments encourages consumers to bring their own utensils and containers. “Those are now currently things that are not being recommended and actually being advised against by the CDC.”

Taking those recommendations into consideration, “We have to ask ourselves as we continue to promote the program are reusable safe to use?” Vegas said.

That’s a question Vegas said she’s not qualified to answer in a straightforward way. “The best that we’ve been trying to do is kind of keep up with what the latest research is saying and what we feel comfortable sharing with our local businesses.”

A group of more than 125 epidemiologists, virologists and other health experts from 18 countries recently signed a statement saying that reusables are safe as long as standard health codes and sanitation guidelines are being followed, Vegas explained.

“The CDC has also come out with a statement saying that the transmission of the virus from surface contact has not yet been documented. Right now, it’s only been transmitted from person to person through respiratory droplets that are inhaled, not from surfaces like cutlery, glasses, plates, those kinds of things,” said Vegas.

Plastic Ocean Project Executive Director Bonnie Monteleone reiterated in an interview with Coastal Review Online how important it is to support local Ocean Friendly Establishments to help eliminate single-use plastics. She said she thought the argument for not using reusable bags is contradictory.

“The items are picked up by the customer and then handled by the cashier and placed in a bag. At this point, it doesn’t matter what type of bag. We encourage people to bring their own bag and not let the cashier touch it, bag their own groceries to reduce contact. Otherwise, the cashier is touching both the items and the plastic bag, which they hand the customer,” Monteleone said.

The Plastic Oceans Project placed a radio advertisement encouraging people to support their Ocean Friendly Establishments. “And when they place their order, we asked that they mention if they do not need single-use, to-go ware or condiments. This was our way of helping mitigate the increase of plastic waste,” she said.

At the time of the interview, Plastic Oceans Project is also promising to contribute $2,000 on top of a $5,000 grant through North Carolina Aquariums that will help offset the expense of compostable products for Ocean Friendly Establishments that cannot afford them right now, she added.

Since March when the governor put in place dining restrictions, Monteleone has observed both positive and negative responses to the change back to single-use plastics.

“Positive because it allows our vulnerable business the opportunity to serve in order to stay afloat, so to speak, and negative because so many individuals shifted to bringing reusable containers and are forbidden to use them in many places,” she said.

Monteleone said that they are fortunate to have restaurants reluctantly using plastics and are trying to find workarounds.

“Slice of Life (Pizzeria & Pub in Wilmington) has been hugely instrumental in encouraging the conversation as well as donating time and funds to start a website strictly for OFEs, so more businesses can work together to reduce single use,” she said. “Ceviche’s is another restaurant working with our OFE team to bring to town a reusable to-go container program much like Green To-go in Durham.”

Vegas said in an interview that many people who are passionate about using reusables would still like to be able to freely use them. “However, there are so many restrictions around reusable products that using items like coffee cups and bags at stores are no longer an option.”

As far as the Ocean Friendly Establishments program goes, the advice is to use reusables when possible.

“If ordering to go, request that plastic cutlery is not included, ask for no bag if it’s a single item, and, if you have extra time, order an item for dine in, then place leftovers in your own container that you bring to the restaurant. Additionally, we’re advising in favor of reusable masks that can be laundered vs the single-use options,” Vegas added.

Some businesses have not been able to maintain the cost of the environmentally friendly to-go ware, including the paper-based clamshells that are extremely expensive and have been less available due to high demands, and some business owners are concerned about losing the Ocean Friendly status with the introduction of Styrofoam or single-use items.

“But we understand as a program that it’s difficult to navigate these new circumstances, and we’re hoping to work together to come up with local solutions,” Vegas said.

Vegas said they’ve had to sort of shift their recommendations but the main recommendation is to support the current Ocean Friendly Establishments.

Meredith Fish, educator with Jennette’s Pier and part of the Ocean Friendly Establishments program, added that “Several places in the area still try their best to use eco-friendly packaging options, however, given the amount of packaging that is required to carry out all the takeout orders, a lot of businesses are reverting back to single-use plastic items such as plastic bags, containers and utensils.”

Fish said she recognized that most people are focusing right now on the virus, which is understandable, “but I wish more people would see single-use plastics as a threat as well,” Fish said.

“I know that the Outer Banks is working hard right now to revamp the recycling program but hopefully everyone remembers that reducing your plastic consumption is even more important than recycling,” she said. “This is why it’s so important to avoid using plastic whenever possible, especially single-use plastics, seeing that you only use them once before they can end up polluting our Earth.”

She opts for glass, metal and paper whenever possible, and “I hope that is the mindset that local businesses will adopt as well, even in the midst of COVID.”

Jan Farmer, a volunteer with the Topsail-area Ocean Friendly Establishments, has also observed that usage of single-use plastics is up because of the large increase in takeout business.

“Businesses that were using compostable takeout or compostable straws have sometimes switched to less environmentally friendly products if their normal products ran out and were unavailable, but they appear to have switched back when they could get the better products in stock,” Farmer explained. “I actually have one establishment that has made the shift to paper cups from Styrofoam during this time.”

“I think it’s important to remember to not lose sight of problems that existed before COVID-19. While we may have to make adjustments to our original plans, the work shouldn’t stop and there will always be things we can do to make a positive impact and to reduce our single-use plastic usage while staying safe and healthy,” Vegas said.

National efforts to curb plastic use

On a national level, more than 120 environmental organizations sent letters to seven national food delivery companies — GrubHub, UberEats, Doordash, Delivery.com, Caviar, Seamless and Postmates — in July requesting that that they change their default ordering process to one that does not automatically include utensils, napkins, condiments and straws in order to reduce the amount of single-use plastic pollution entering oceans, landfills and incinerators.

“Takeout orders are up all over the country as a result of the COVID pandemic; however, the vast majority of people eating at home neither need nor want yet another set of plastic utensils, plastic straws, handful of soy sauce or ketchup packets, or pile of paper napkins. Committing to making this small change to their delivery ordering systems would help reduce single-use packaging and save restaurants a bit of money,” said Judith Enck, president of Beyond Plastics.

The letter suggests that customers would need to request no single-use items when they place their order for delivery, which would reduce costs to restaurants and take a step to reduce plastic waste and pollution. There is also a place to voice support of this initiative, Hold the Plastic, on the website.

As consumers continue to rely on delivery services for meals, the amount of unwanted single-use utensils and condiments are on the rise as well, though a recent study found that 98% of all U.S. take-out or delivery meals are consumed at home or a workplace, where reusable cutlery is typically available and preferred, according to the release.

“Food delivery platforms have the opportunity to reduce the amount of plastic entering our homes while at the same time saving businesses money by moving to an opt-in system for these items. Similar to how customers choose exactly which toppings they want on their pizza, customers should also be able to opt in to exactly which utensils, napkins, condiments, or straws they want,” said Jennie Romer, Legal Associate at the Surfrider Foundation’s Plastic Pollution Initiative, in the release.

Ordering in to support local restaurants & stay safe during #COVID? Urge @Grubhub @DoorDash @Seamless @Caviar @Postmates to follow @UberEats lead & change #singleuseplastic utensils, straws, condiments & napkins to opt-in only to cut #plasticpollution. https://t.co/Crqkr3Cjup

— Beyond Plastics (@PlasticsBeyond) August 3, 2020

Enck addressed in an op-ed April 22 in Newsweek that the pandemic isn’t an excuse to go back to single-use plastics.

“I still believe that. And yet, the Center for Disease Control has put out guidance to restaurants when they’re reopening telling them, even if people are dining on site, the restaurants should use single use disposable items single use plates utensils cups and straws,” she said, adding that if you’re trying to protect the health of the wait staff, it doesn’t matter if they’re going to be delivering and picking up single use disposables or real dishes that are washed.

“My final point is we can tackle more than one crisis at a time. Clearly, the priority needs to be protecting health from the COVID virus, so we can still address plastic pollution and climate change. We can’t return to business as usual. We need adjust recovery, and that includes making environmental protection, a priority, Enck said