Make Your Event Zero Waste
Walking Mountains provides education and outreach about recycling and composting while supporting special events with their environmental sustainability initiatives. The Walking Mountains Zero Waste program is available to special events in the Eagle Valley on a contract service basis. Each event is unique and requires planning and coordination with event staff and vendors to ensure success. We will provide expertise, coordination, trained staff and volunteers, and so much more to ensure each event is a sustainability success.
In 2025, we worked 127 days of events and diverted 72,888 pounds of waste from the landfill through recycling and composting, with a total diversion rate of 85.41%
Make Your Event Zero Waste
Zero waste events are a great way to show your commitment to community environmental stewardship. The key to zero waste events is careful planning so event materials are reusable, recyclable, or compostable. Walking Mountains partners with event producers to create successful zero waste events by providing planning support before the event and friendly staff during the event to ensure success from start to finish.
Hosting an event in Eagle County and want to make it a zero waste event? We can help!
What is a Zero Waste Event?
A zero waste event doesn’t just have some recycling bins laying around. We make sure that there is ample access to full zero waste stations, and that everything coming into the event can be either composted or recycled on site. Here are a few crucial components:
1. Reducing the amount of total waste created during an event and reducing the need for materials to be recycled or composted.
2. Reusing items as much as possible reduces the need to produce new items, conserves energy, and keeps materials out of the landfill.
3. Recycling and composting comes after you’ve done all you can to reduce and reuse. A good goal is to have less than 10% of event waste go to the landfill.
Work with Us
Join the team and become part of the increasing movement to educate the public about the importance of waste reduction and diversion! Volunteer and paid contract staff opportunities available. Work community events from Go Pro Mountain Games to Birds of Prey and the Eagle County Rodeo.
Upcoming Sustainability Events
The Sustainable Film Series – The Engine Inside
Core Transit Pop-Up
Community Water Panel: Water, Drought, and the Future of Agriculture in the West
Zero waste fAQs
The Eagle County Materials Recovery Facility accepts glass beverage containers, aluminum and steel cans, corrugated cardboard boxes, office paper, magazines, and emptied plastic containers No. 1 through No. 7. If you are unsure of how to properly dispose of something, you can ask the Eagle County Waste Wizard app.
If you do not have curbside recycling through a local waste hauler, there are free recycling drop-site locations available throughout Eagle Valley, including Vail, Avon, Edwards, Eagle, Gypsum, and Red Cliff. All recycling drop-sites are dual-stream, which means that paper, cardboard, and comingle materials (recyclable plastics, glass, aluminum, etc.) have to be separated into separate containers. All drop sites will have 3 or more containers labeled with the materials that can be disposed of in those containers. Vail Honeywagon offers a compost subscription program that provides access to a compost dumpster at the Avon, Eagle, Edwards, and Vail recycling drop sites for a small monthly fee.
Recyclables collected from the Eagle County drop sites are taken to the Eagle County Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) in Wolcott and are separated, baled, and readied for direct shipment to end users. Recyclables collected curbside from local haulers are taken to MRFs in Denver.
A zero-waste event is designed to divert as much waste as possible away from landfills through recycling, composting, and reuse. The goal is typically to divert at least 90% of waste at an event. This is achieved through planning and coordination with Walking Mountains event staff and vendors before the event. Trained staff and volunteers provide education and outreach at zero-waste events and sort all of the waste at the end to ensure successful diversion. Interested in making your event zero-waste?
The Walking Mountains Zero Waste Team helps plan and manage zero-waste events by coordinating with vendors beforehand, providing waste stations and bags, trained staff, educational signage and interactions, and post-event sorting and diversion data. In 2025, we worked 126 days, and diverted 72,888 pounds of waste from the landfill with a diversion rate of 87%.
Eagle County residents can dispose of household hazardous waste by bringing it to the Household Hazardous Waste Facility in Wolcott. Residents can bring up to 20 items a year at no charge. E-waste can also be recycled there for a fee of 20 cents per pound. Avon, Eagle, Gypsum, Minturn, and Vail host annual Hard to Recycle events in May where you can drop off hazardous items and e-waste for free. If you are unsure about what goes where, you can ask the Eagle County Waste Wizard app.
We always need paid contract staff or volunteers to work our zero-waste events. Please fill out the interest form here and someone will be in touch with you.
If you are unsure of how to properly dispose of something, you can ask the Eagle County Waste Wizard app! You can download the app, available for both Apple and Android.
Check out the schedule and register for a FREE community recycling tour. We also offer free private tours that can be scheduled for school groups, community members, businesses, and more. Fill out this form to request a tour.
Yes! Free recycling tours take place on a quarterly basis, but registration is required. You can check the schedule and register here. We also offer free private tours that can be scheduled for school groups, community members, businesses, and more. Fill out this form to request a tour.
Join us for a FREE, three-hour recycling tour that takes you behind the scenes of Eagle County’s waste and recycling system. Discover where your trash actually goes, what happens to your recyclables, and how local facilities manage materials from start to finish.
Offered in both English and Spanish, the tour begins at the Eagle County Household Hazardous Waste Facility. From there, you’ll visit the landfill, explore the Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) where recyclables are sorted, and wrap up at the Vail Honeywagon Compost Facility.
It’s your chance to get answers to all your waste-related questions and separate recycling facts from fiction.
No! Recycling tours are meant for people of all ages and are offered in English and Spanish. We welcome anyone who wants to join us to learn more about waste diversion!
The Eagle County Waste Wizard is a website and app that tells you how to properly dispose of your waste. Simply enter the item you are looking to dispose of and it will tell you if it can be recycled, composted, or where it can be disposed of. Check out the site here or download our mobile app to always have an answer at your fingertips!
We offer free private recycling tours that can be scheduled for school groups, community members, businesses, and more. Fill out this form to request a tour. If you do not have a group, sign up for one of our free community recycling tours that happen on a quarterly basis. View the schedule and register here.
Vail Honeywagon has a compost drop site program that Eagle County residents can pay a small monthly fee to participate in. Depending on your town, there might be a curbside composting program.
Fill out this interest form with the information about your event and our team will contact you in 2-3 business days.