GBB, as a subcontractor to ERG, was tasked by the US EPA with conducting solid waste management training and developing waste management case studies for tribes in EPA Region 7, which serves nine tribal nations in the Midwestern United States. The purpose of these studies was to provide valuable regional information on the divertible materials in the Tribes’ waste streams and served to inform the Tribes’ solid waste management plans and related decisions.

Together, the EPA, ERG, and GBB collaborated with four (4) Region 7 Tribes located in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska to develop a multi-pronged Tribal waste assessment training program that the EPA, in turn, could share to empower other Tribes and small communities to strengthen their integrated solid waste management plans.

The four Tribes that engaged in this project represent small, rural communities with populations of approximately 450 to 4,000 residents. To ensure the training program was impactful, accessible, and sensitive to these communities, GBB worked with EPA and ERG to develop the following content and materials to be publicly available via the EPA’s website:

• Virtual waste characterization training sessions
• Live waste characterization training sessions
• Waste characterization student handbook
• Video demonstrations
• Supplemental resources, such as EPA publications, data, and record-keeping templates, etc.

Highlights from the Tribal Waste Sort Training project include:

• Knowledge sharing of waste assessment basics, waste sort safety, and the importance of data management, specifically among Tribes with small populations and limited resources
• Discussion on ways Tribes can use waste sort data to work with entities within the tribe, as well as other entities in the local area, to achieve improved integrated solid waste management planning and operations
• Recording of specific tribal nations’ experience with conducting waste assessments, successes, and challenges
• A deeper understanding of the process for creating publicly available video and written content for the EPA