A recycling program at UNCC has won a national award. The campus has a growing student body with over 21,000 students last year. The campus is growing along with the student body.

Construction on a new bio-infomatics building and student union is going on right now. That construction can generate a lot of waste. David Jones’s job is to prevent waste.

“We didn't want to keep seeing it go to mixed-waste landfills. So we thought how can we find a recycling alternative for the material,” he said.

Three years ago, the university started a construction recycling program. Two years ago it recycled 700,000 pounds of construction material. Last year the total jumped to 2.1 million pounds.

In July, the program won the Effective and Innovation Practices award from a national education group.

All the metal, wood, and yard waste from construction and demolition ends up in huge bins.

“The yard waste goes to compost central and the wood is grinded up and we use it as mulch,” Jones said.

They even saved the trees that were cut down for the student union, and ground them into mulch for landscaping. They took river-washed stones off the top of two buildings they’re updating. They will reuse them in the foundation of the new student union.

The construction company building the union is required to recycle 35 percent of its material.