Recyclers at Colorado State and Cu Team Up on Sept. 5

More than football players will be flattened when the Colorado State Rams and Colorado Buffaloes meet on the field of Mile High Stadium on Sept. 5.

A dozen student recycling employees from both universities will be flattening aluminum cans, plastic bottles and cardboard boxes collected from tailgate parties and entrance gates. Believed to be the first joint recycling effort between colleges in the country, the upcoming "Mile High Showdown" will also be the first organized recycling effort at Mile High Stadium.

"The rivalry between recycling programs is growing every bit as much as the rivalry on the playing field," said Jack DeBell, director of CU Recycling. "This game is an exciting opportunity to save valuable resources while building some healthy competition between CSU and CU’s recycling programs."

Recycling staff from the two schools met with the operators of Mile High Stadium and Denver’s recycling program to design a recycling experiment for the capacity crowd. "Large stadium games pose unique recycling challenges but offer huge amounts of cans, bottles and boxes which can be recovered for beneficial use," said Chris Booth, director of Colorado State’s recycling program.

"The CU-CSU game at Mile High Stadium offers a terrific opportunity to demonstrate how recycling can work at major sporting events," said Denver Mayor Wellington E. Webb. "We’re very pleased to be a part of this excellent partnership among universities, stadium management and Denver Recycles – the state’s largest municipal recycling program."

Fans attending the game should bring their cans and bottles to specially marked containers located in the parking lots and around the perimeter of the stadium.