Krista L Thyberg

Stony Brook University | Stony Brook · Department of Technology and Society

Understanding the composition of disposed municipal solid waste (MSW) and recyclables can lead to better waste management. New York State (United States) has never had a state-wide waste characterization sorting program. In 2021, sampling was conducted at 11 locations, representing 25% of the state population outside of New York City. Twenty-three...

Objectives Poor decision-making is a hallmark of the COVID-19 pandemic. Better metrics would help improve decision-makers’ understanding of the scope of the pandemic and allow for better public understanding/review of these decisions. Study Design Two novel metrics of disease impact were compared with more commonly used standard metrics. Methods...

Using a web-based survey conducted among 2,481 Namibian, aged 18 years or older, the factors and motivations driving individuals’ decisions on marine fish consumption, spatial fish consumption, and possible strategies to promote domestic marine fish consumption were explored. Most participants (97.9%) were aware of the importance of fish in the hum...

The issue of seafood waste has been gaining attention globally due to the increasing demand for seafood, its negative impacts on the environment, and its implications for marine conservation and policy. This study examined seafood waste in Namibia, a country with a large commercial fishing industry but limited baseline data on seafood waste. To gai...

In the summer of 2016, we observed a pair of Charadrius melodus (Piping Plover) successfully hatch 2 nests at Fire Island National Seashore and fledge chicks from both broods. Double brooding is rare among Piping Plovers, and fledging chicks from both broods is rarer still. In 2017, we observed male and female siblings, 1 individual hatched from ea...

Single stream recyclables collection (residents set out all recyclables in one container without sorting them further) has become the dominant means of curbside recycling in the United States. Proponents claim it motivates residents to set out more materials for recovery because it is more convenient than other collection strategies; others claim i...

A Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) was conducted to determine the environmental impacts of several waste treatment scenarios for a suburban New York (U.S.) municipality. The study goal was to determine if separate food waste recovery and management was environmentally sounder than waste-to-energy incineration (the baseline case). Three alternatives, enc...

There has been growing interest in establishing food waste prevention and recovery programs throughout the world. The drive to target food waste stems from increasing concerns about resource conservation, food security, food waste's environmental and economic costs, and a general trend in the waste management industry to transition to more sustaina...

Food waste has major consequences for social, nutritional, economic, and environmental issues, and yet the amount of food waste disposed in the U.S. has not been accurately quantified. We introduce the transparent and repeatable methods of meta-analysis and systematic reviewing to determine how much food is discarded in the U.S., and to determine i...

Waste management is a complex task involving numerous waste fractions, a range of technological treatment options, and many outputs that are circulated back into society. A systematic, interdisciplinary systems management framework was developed to facilitate the planning, implementation, and maintenance of sustainable waste systems. It aims not to...

Six tonnes of discards and recyclables from three waste districts in a New York suburb were sorted in 2012. The districts were chosen because one had a higher recycling percentage, one had median performance, and one was a low performing district. ASTM standards were followed for the waste composition sorting. The results showed, as expected, that...

Plastic waste forms a substantial part of municipal solid waste and has caused environmental concerns, particularly due to the chemical contamination of the environment and effects from persistent litter. Plastics also complicate waste management processes, such as by having poor recovery rates through recycling and causing contamination in compost...

The primary objective of waste management technologies and policies in the United States is to reduce the harmful environmental impacts of waste, particularly those relating to energy consumption and climate change. Performance indicators are frequently used to evaluate the environmental quality of municipal waste systems, as well as to compare and...

Municipal solid waste (MSW) is generated in very large quantities (probably between 200 and 400 million tonnes per year) in the USA. MSW is generated at millions of places and there is no one precise, general definition for MSW that is generally applied-despite US Environmental Protection Agency efforts. As an element of both commerce and politics,...