Formula
Diversion rates measure (usually by weight) the portion of waste not sent to the landfill. Tracking your diversion rate over time is a great way to measure of the effectiveness of reuse, recycling, and organic composting programs.
The formula for calculating your diversion rate is:
To find your diversion rate:
- Divide the Weight of Diverted Waste Only by the Weight of All Waste.
- Multiply the quotient by 100.
- The result is your Diversion Rate.
Example
As an example, let us examine the hypothetical office building with both recycling and composting programs.
Table 1 shows the monthly weight for each waste stream.
Table 1: Monthly Weights by Waste Stream
| Recyclables
|
1,200
|
| Organics (compostable)
|
690
|
| Garbage
|
450
|
| Total Weight (lbs)
|
2,340
|
For this scenario, the diversion rate equation looks like this:
To find the diversion rate:
- Add the weight of Recyclables and the weight of Organics.
This will be your dividend.
- Add the weight of Recyclables, Organics, and Garbage.
This will be your divisor.
- Divide the sum of Recyclables and Organics by the sum of Recyclables, Organics, and Garbage.
- Multiply the quotient by 100.
- The result is your Diversion Rate.
Now, we plug in the numbers from the table:
To find the diversion rate in this case:
- Add the weight of Recyclables (1,200) and the weight of Organics (690). This will be your dividend.
- Add the weight of Recyclables (1,200), Organics (690), and Garbage (450). This will be your divisor.
- Divide the sum of Recyclables and Organics (1,890) by the sum of Recyclables, Organics, and Garbage (2,340).
- Multiply the quotient by 100.
- The Diversion Rate is 80.8%
In the above scenario, about eighty-one percent of all waste produced is diverted from a landfill because this office implemented recycling and organics waste diversion programs.