Pedaling for a Cleaner America

Keep Virginia Beautiful (KVB) hosted a cleanup in June 2014 in honor of Pedaling For A Cleaner America. Volunteers picked up litter from the park along Dock Street and the start of Virginia Capital Trail near 17th Street, continued to 14th Street and proceeded across Mayo Bridge.

John Deuel, the recently retired recycling coordinator for the City of Norfolk and Keep Norfolk Beautiful, has been rode his bike across America beginning in April 2014 to raise funds and awareness for Keep America Beautiful and bicycle safety for kids. He did cleanups at some of his stops across America but Richmond’s event was a focal point.

With the World Road Cycling Championships coming to Richmond in September 2015, the Virginia Capital Trail and the numerous biking initiatives growing, KVB is hoping to capitalize on the biking craze. Partners in this endeavor were the Richmond Clean City Commission, Richmond 2015, Virginia Capital Trail, City of Richmond Sustainability–RVA Green, James River Association and the many biking groups across the RVA region.

Keep Virginia Beautiful’s mission is to engage and unite Virginians to improve our natural and scenic environment. Since 1953, KVB has been bringing people together to build vibrant communities through litter prevention, waste reduction, recycling, beautification, and education. Get involved with KVB to help deliver a positive and lasting impact by visiting www.keepvirginiabeautiful.org.

Using Food Waste to Grow New Food

Natural Organic Process Enterprises (NOPE) collects compostable waste from institutions, restaurants, schools, and businesses, and through an agreement with Enrichmond, turns the waste into compost for use by Enrichmond's participating partners. Companies that qualify but have no use for the compost get credits instead, and they can use the credits to donate compost to non-profits.

Recently, for instance, Watkins Nursery matched the Hilton Garden Hotel's donation to the Richmond Grows Gardens program for use at the Crafty Kids community garden at 404 Broad Rock Road and the Owl Orchard community garden at 801 W. 44th Street. The goal is to get all the community gardens as much compost as they need.

Organic waste recycling is a growing trend and is part of a comprehensive sustainability plan. Organic waste is anything that once lived or grew. NOPE focuses primarily on food waste and provides the logistical know-how for companies and institutions to support organic recycling by separating food waste from recyclable and non-recyclable waste. NOPE provides instruction and materials to partners to get them started, schedules and provides small batch collection and transportation to accredited compost facilities.

The Hilton Garden Inn in downtown Richmond composts all of its food waste, supports recycling projects in local schools, and collects used soap for recycling in support of international mission projects. The hotel won the 2013 Virginia Green Travel Star award.