Tag Archive for: sustainable

Why HDPE Is a Superior Material

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HDPE (high-density polyethylene) is a durable solid plastic that has a variety of applications. Most notably, HDPE is used for bathroom partitions and stalls, commercial lockers and student lockers within educational facilities. Many businesses and schools have implemented HDPE materials with amazing results. So, why is HDPE being considered a super material for facilities?

Durability

As a facility manager, when it comes time for remodeling and renovations, you need to think ahead. Choosing a highly durable material has its advantages because you want the material lasting throughout the years without having to pay a fortune for replacements. HDPE has proven to be a stronger, more stable material than most plastics, wood, and even metal. It’s impact-resistant, so it can stand up to the pressures and elements of your facility.

When you choose HDPE, you no longer have to worry about any exterior damages. HDPE won’t scratch or dent, so you don’t have to have replacements on-hand. You don’t even have to worry about graffiti, because with HDPE, it can be easily wiped away.

Improving Air Quality

One of the main reasons why HDPE materials are utilized as restroom stalls is because it not only provides security and privacy, but it can also help keep the air quality high. Restrooms are a hotbed of moisture and humidity. Most plastic partitions have a kraft paper or cardboard core that can become moist, and eventually will sprout mold. Mold will not only lower the air quality, but it’ll result in a pungent odor that won’t be corrected with air fresheners.

When standard plastic partitions have mold sprouting inside of them, it’s too late, and they’ll have to be replaced in order to get rid of the mold. HDPE, on the other hand, resists mold growth because of its solid plastic construction. Because mold can’t grow in HDPE partitions, your air quality won’t drop, and you won’t have to replace your partitions anytime soon.

Low Maintenance

One phrase that facility managers love to hear is “low maintenance.” HDPE plastic doesn’t require a lot of upkeep. Because it’s a highly durable material, it doesn’t get the normal wear and tear that most materials get. In fact, it can outlast most plastics and won’t rust like metal. It doesn’t even require any fresh coats of paint because of its homogenous coloring. All that HDPE requires is a light cleaning every now and again.

Sustainability

Another major benefit to HDPE is that it’s made from 100% post-consumer recycled material. They’re even recyclable themselves. You can effectively take your facility in a greener, more eco-friendly direction by installing HDPE lockers and partitions. Because it doesn’t require new coats of paint, you greatly reduce the risk of VOC (volatile organic compound) emissions in the air, which can reduce the quality and have a negative effect on occupant health.

 

To learn more about why HDPE is a superior material, download our FREE eBook, The Ultimate Guide to HDPE Plastic Lockers, or contact us at Scranton Products.

10 Ways to Make Your Existing School a Greener Facility

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Do you ever try to come up with new ways to improve your school’s efficiency? Making a pre-existing school facility greener can be a frustrating concept; but it’s not that hard to take the building in a greener direction with a few implementations and additions. Here are 10 ways that you can make your existing school a greener facility.

 1. Use Green Cleaning Products.

One of the best ways you can take a step toward making your school greener is by using green cleaning products. These products are free of harmful chemicals and leave very little effect on the environment.

 2. Improve Recycling Programs.

Getting behind a more thorough recycling program is essential. Make sure that your facility is executing these practices. You can also use it to educate students about the importance of reusing, reducing, and recycling.

 3. Use Green Building Materials.

If you’re considering any remodels or renovations in the coming year, you may want to utilize green building materials that’ll not only last, but will make your facility more efficient. Materials like HDPE (high-density polyethylene) not only provide high durability due to being impact-resistant, but they’re also recyclable and require very little maintenance due to being power-washable.

 4. Open the Windows.

If the weather’s right, you may want to consider opening the windows, rather than relying on the HVAC system. It helps by providing fresh air to students and faculty, and it helps you save energy costs.

 5. Get Plants for the Classroom.

Placing a plant in each classroom has numerous benefits. A plant can help reduce dust and carbon dioxide levels while preventing the growth of pollutants. It can also help improve humidity.

 6. Find Weaknesses in Your HVAC and Water Systems.

There’s nothing like a flaw in your energy systems to prevent your school from entering the green realm. Conduct an audit of your HVAC and water systems to find out if there are any repairs you should make in order to avoid wasting energy.

 7. Improve Your Air Quality.

Improving your air quality is one of the benchmarks for greening your facility. While air fresheners can be effective, seeking out the culprit that’s reducing the quality of your air is far more effective. Oftentimes, the stalls and partitions in the restroom and locker rooms of your school are sprouting mold. Consider replacing them with the previously mentioned HDPE, which is resistant to moisture and humidity.

 8. Consider Going Solar.

A lot of schools and commercial buildings have made the jump to solar energy. With just a few panels, you can reduce your energy costs while having your facility run on clean solar power.

 9. Test Your Water.

It’s always smart to ensure that you’re supplying your students and faculty with the cleanest drinking water possible. Check the quality of your water supply to make sure it’s in good standing.

10. Reduce Your Energy Use.

While the classrooms and hallways should be well-lit, there are other ways that you can reduce your energy use. One of the best and easiest ways is by turning off all the computers before leaving for the day, rather than setting them to sleep mode.

 

By implementing a few of these practices, you’ll see a noticeable difference, and your school will become greener every day. Do you want to learn more about how to make your school greener? Download the Sustainable Building Products: How to Make Your Facility Eco-Friendly from Top to Bottom eBook, courtesy of Scranton Products.

Where School Facilities Are Falling Behind: Improve Your Infrastructure Report Card

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How’s your school facility holding up? Does it meet the standards of the ASCE Infrastructure Report Card? There are a variety of factors that can attribute to a school falling behind based on its infrastructure and overall safety. The Infrastructure Report Card assesses the current state of your facility and how it’ll last over the years.

Getting an A is easier said than done. It requires your school facility to be in exceptional shape and have the capacity to handle its growing student body. However, a lot of schools fall behind because of the lack of maintenance or renovations to help keep the facility prepared for the future. Usually, these schools all suffer the same drawbacks that can affect their Infrastructure Report Card. Here are a few tips to get started and to improve your grade.

Finding Weak Areas in Your Facility

Before you try to improve your grade, you need to figure out what’s holding your facility back. While your school may not be in shambles, it’s important to consider all the factors with not only the structural integrity, but also with the various systems and components inside. Have an audit of your facility so you can have a manageable list of things to work on in order to bump up your grade on the Infrastructure Report Card.

Testing Your Air Quality

One of the most common contributors to a less than adequate grade of a facility is its air quality. This is a huge factor because not only does it have a negative effect on your grade, but it can also put your occupants’ health at risk. If you begin to search for areas with weak air quality, you should start with the restrooms.

Restrooms are a hotbed of mold growth due to the overwhelming moisture and humidity. While the walls and surfaces can be cleaned extensively to combat the threat of mold, the battle may be useless if it’s begun sprouting in your stalls and partitions. It’ll greatly reduce the air quality, as well as emit foul odors. A great way to reduce the risk of mold growth is replacing your stalls and partitions with a stronger material like HDPE (high-density polyethylene). This plastic material is not only resistant to scratches and dents, but due to its solid construction, mold won’t find a way to sprout inside.

Choosing Sustainable Products

One of the biggest contributors to the A grade on the Infrastructure Report Card is that the facility is long lasting. One way to help keep your facility in long-lasting shape is by utilizing sustainable materials that’ll last the years without any signs of damage or wear. The previously mentioned HDPE is one of the best materials to use for this. While it can help boost your bathroom’s air quality, HDPE can also be used for lockers. The lockers will outlast traditional metal or coated steel because they won’t dent, and will even resist graffiti.

Using HDPE materials wherever you can will benefit your school greatly. Not only will this material improve your air quality and resist any damage, but it’s also very low maintenance. You can save on maintenance costs because HDPE only needs routine cleaning—no repainting or adjusting.

 

Want to learn more about how you can improve your Infrastructure Report Card grade? Get the Sustainable Building Products: How to Make Your Facility Eco-Friendly from Top to Bottom or The Ultimate Guide for Facility Maintenance & Property Solutions eBooks, courtesy of Scranton Products.

Teaching Children About Sustainability in School: Practice What You Preach

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When you’re managing a sustainable educational facility, it’s important to impart your wisdom to the occupants and students that grace the halls and classrooms. Sustainability is one of the most important factors in today’s society, as it’s crucial to the overall well-being of our planet and its occupants. But in order to practice what you preach, sustainability education should be implemented early on so students can understand the best practices and benefits.

Learning How to Make Your Building More Sustainable

When you’re managing a facility or school, it’s always a good idea to move forward with steps toward making your facility more sustainable. While you may be thinking that the only way to do that is by taking your recycling program to the next level, you’ll be surprised to know that there are ways where you can make your actual building more sustainable and eco-friendly.

You can start off by switching to green cleaning products that’ll reduce harmful emissions in your air. Another way is by using green LEED building materials when it comes time for renovations and remodeling. There are different materials like eco-friendly windows, recycled flooring, and even solar panels to help reduce the carbon footprint.

You can even change the lockers and bathroom stalls by using the 100% recyclable HDPE (high-density polyethylene) plastic. This material doesn’t scratch, corrode, or fall victim to unhealthy mold growth. Another major benefit is that it doesn’t delaminate or require a fresh coat of paint. You’ll cut a lot of costs when it comes to maintenance, and you won’t have to repaint them and add unhealthy VOC (volatile organic compounds) emissions to your school’s air.

Educating Students About Sustainability

While we’re growing acclimated to a greener lifestyle, we need to educate younger students on the importance of environmentally conscious practices like sustainability. The best ways to approach sustainability education is through hands-on experience. Show your students how to effectively recycle their waste through separating the different materials and even composting the organic waste.

While on the topic of composting, you can work your way toward another sustainable aspect: gardening. Compost goes from our normal food and yard waste and becomes a fertile material that provides exceptional nutrients to growing plants and vegetables. Teach the students that gardening and other agricultural practices benefit the environment and its inhabitants.

Finally, one of the most important steps to teach children about is conservation. Educating them on the benefits of conserving energy and water can be useful. If you implement fun educational methods, students will take the knowledge to heart and apply it to their daily lives. By taking the necessary steps to educate today’s youth about sustainability, you’ll pave the way toward a brighter and greener future for generations.

 

Was this blog post helpful? Do you want to learn more about how to make your facility more sustainable? Download the eBook, Sustainable Building Products: How to Make Your Facility Eco-Friendly from Top to Bottom, courtesy of Scranton Products.

Give Your Janitor A Break This Summer – Install Duralife Lockers®

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Lets talk about janitors, you know, those guys and gals, who are always there, on the ready with a sponge, broom or mop, just when you need them. They are in our schools all year long, available for any size clean up, taking care of the spills our kids make in the lunchroom, classroom and hallways. They go about their business undetected, coming out when needed. But do you know one of the ways they spend their summer (that coveted time of the year when your kids are home with you)? We do – they clean what they couldn’t clean during the year, the student’s lockers!

Making The Move Away From Metal

While we are spending our 3 months of summer relaxing at the beach, and eating ice cream, the school janitorial staff is cleaning up from the previous 9 months while school was in session. Schools with metal lockers have a regularly scheduled task associated with those lockers during the summer months, debridement of rust, dent repairs, chemical cleaning of graffiti and surface repainting. Lockers take a beating during the school year, with books being banged around, food deposits and spills, and not to mention, the dreaded odors of smelly, sweaty gym clothes. The labor-intensive cleanup task is costly to the school district, in several areas including labor, materials, and air & surface quality. As you can see, traditional metal lockers require extensive care and maintenance, and still don’t meet the needs of the busy school environment. But, we have a solution, Duralife Lockers® made with HDPE (High Density Polyethylene).

Duralife Lockers® are specifically designed to meet the durability and environmental demands of today’s busy schools. Made with solid-core HDPE, these lockers are impact, scratch and dent resistant, and hold up to the toughest student use. Graffiti readily wipes off the non-porous surface, and because they are impervious to moisture, Duralife Lockers® will never rust, corrode or delaminate. In addition, the HDPE surface does not harbor mold, mildew or bacterial growth, and the lockers can be fully power-washed or steam-cleaned. In short, with Duralife Lockers® you can say goodbye to rust, mold, graffiti, scratches, dents, and worrisome bacteria, and say hello to years of worry-free, low maintenance.

 

Robert Gannon, High School Facilities Director, on the benefits of HDPE lockers.

*Testing conducted by SiTU Biosciences LLC by the ISO 22196 methods

 

Sleek Modern Design For The School Hallways Of Tomorrow

When it comes to design, the modern sleek, simple lines of the Duralife® Locker line, make them a polished and aesthetically pleasing addition to any school hallway. They can really kick it up with their color options that bring high style to any atmosphere. The sustainability and durability stand up over time, making them a smart investment for today and tomorrow.

So Show Your Janitors Some Love This Summer – Invest In The Smart Choice – Duralife Lockers®

Download our brochure and see for yourself how HDPE Duralife Lockers® compare to traditional metal lockers – and Show Your Janitor Some Love This Summer!

Green Building Materials: Types of Green Building Materials

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Whether you’re designing a new facility or looking to do some renovations on your current facility, utilizing green building materials is a smart route to take. Sustainability is important when picking your building materials because you want them to last a long time. Luckily, there’s a variety of green building materials and sustainable products that can be used to make your facility structurally sound and eco-friendly.

Green Building Materials & Why You Should Use Them

When planning to build or renovate, choosing the right materials based off of sustainable design practices is crucial. When you choose a green material, it means that not only are you getting a quality product that will last for a long time, but you’re also doing your part to positively impact the environment long-term.

Sustainable Flooring

If you’re starting at the ground level, flooring will probably be your first step. Several types of flooring look good and also are sustainable, meaning that you likely won’t have to replace it in the short-term.

Linoleum, for example, is a smooth, eco-friendly flooring made from linseed oil, jute, and flax that doesn’t release VOCs (volatile organic compounds) like other types of flooring, such as vinyl. Repurposed wood is also a great option because it looks good and has been recycled.

Sustainable Roofing

Your roofing material needs to be durable so it can resist the elements but also sustainable enough that replacement will be far down the road. Tile is a good option because it’s thicker, so it helps to keep cool or warm air inside. Choosing a lighter color also has benefits because it reflects less heat into the atmosphere.

Sustainable Windows

A lot of considerations go into choosing sustainable and eco-friendly windows, especially if you intend to meet LEED standards. Starting with the frames, you should always choose a stronger material that’s more likely to improve insulation.

When it comes to choosing the glass, you could get multiple panes that will trap air between the panes to improve the facility’s insulation. If you prefer single-pane windows, you could get a clear coating that doesn’t affect the visibility but does enhance the ability to retain warm and cool air inside the facility.

Sustainable Plastic School Lockers, Bathroom Stalls & Partitions 

Making your facility greener isn’t just about the overall construction but also the materials inside. When designing your bathroom, instead of choosing a  metal or stainless steel for your stalls and partitions, try HDPE (high-density polyethylene). It’s a durable material that is resistant to moisture, scratches, and graffiti. It also doesn’t require painting, which results in less VOC emissions.

Another benefit is that HDPE products such as partitions and lockers contain recycled post-consumer products. By choosing HDPE, you take a huge step in making your facility more green and sustainable.

Eco-Friendly Building Materials

When renovating or erecting an eco-friendly building, it’s essential embrace to pick the right building materials. Then you can consider better ways to use solar energy and recycle rain water.

Want to learn more about how you can make your facility green? Download our eBook Sustainable Building Products: How to Make Your Facility Eco-Friendly from Top to Bottom.

If you have any questions about the benefits of HDPE and the sustainability of our school lockers and commercial bathroom stalls, contact us at Scranton Products.