Our project is located in a nearby suburb of a very economically depressed city.
It is not uncommon to have copper stripped from live transformers and stolen from construction trailers and stolen from open installations before walls are enclosed.
However, I was surprised to hear that old HVAC equipment that was slated for diversion from the landfills (after the refrigerants had been removed, of course), had been stolen from our dumpster before the hauler could remove it, weigh it, and report it toward our diversion goals. As this equipment was quite hefty, it was a significant contributor to our overall percentage. Our dumpster area cannot be made any more secure than it already is for egress reasons adjacent to this area.
Is there any recourse to still be able to count this equipment by estimating what its weight might have been or do we just kiss its contribution to our totals good-bye?
Has anyone had similar issues?
Valerie Walsh
Sustainable Design & Construction ConsultantsWalsh Sustainability Group
219 thumbs up
August 31, 2010 - 1:40 pm
Kathy: While I have not had this experience on any of our projects nor have I heard of a similar occurrence, I can simply offer an opinion as a practitioner.
I suspect that since you have no way of knowing how much of the stolen HVAC equipment will be reused or salvaged and what portion of the equipment might be dumped, my guess is that it would not be counted towards diverted weight since it cannot be substantiated.
You know more about whether this particular equipment was still serviceable making that the most likely motivation for the theft, or whether it was more valuable for its’ parts or as scrap metal. If you think it might still be in use and it is a very small community, you could have some fun with it and offer a small token reward for whoever comes forward to take “credit” for helping your team keep it out of the landfill! If they would give you a statement or just a photo of it in use, you are back on course. Or if they sold it for scrap, that is okay too! You just want substantiation it got diverted in some way. See if you can make the dumspter divers "partners in green"!
Jennifer Berthelot-Jelovic
Director of SustainabilityShangri-La Construction
69 thumbs up
December 15, 2011 - 5:40 pm
Though I can't help you with your current situation, I have experienced this as well on more than one project. We actually now request that our dumpsters have locking lids to prohibit this from happening in the future.