Mobil helps Guam get a clean START

by Jason Salas

Guam - One of the island's petroleum companies recently decided to exercise some good corporate citizenship and make it easier and safe for island residents get rid of their waste.  As part of the company's 60th anniversary of being in business on Guam, this past weekend, Mobil Oil Guam volunteers gathered at the company's Tamuning service station to take part in START program.

An acronym for Simple Tasks Aimed At Reducing Trash, the recycling event helped Guamanians from all over the island properly dispose of their aluminum, plastic and cardboard waste materials.  

Project manager Bill Ada says they were inspired by First Lady Joann Camacho's program and jumped at the opportunity to get involved, telling KUAM News, "We reached out to the First Lady to see how we can get involved and take initiative for getting actively involved with recycling, so the Simple Task Aimed At Reducing Trash is something simple that we wanted to get involved in. and so when we reached out to the first lady, she said, 'Hey why don't we start something with the stations, being that they're located all throughout the island?'"

Ada adds that this is the first step in a broad and solid commitment to the community in helping to keep our island clean. "Right now, the collection points for aluminum cans are pretty widespread in the schools and we have the iRecycle program, but there's nothing really for plastic bottles, or cardboard for that matter," he continued.  "We thought this would be a perfect opportunity to serve as a collection point for everybody."

And while this latest event involved a single, highly-trafficked station in the island's central region, the company definitely has plans to expand outward and make recycling outlets available from end-to-end.  "Eventually the long-term plan is to try and se if we can get some other stations involved.  We have some large service stations down south as well as up north," said Ada.