Cigarette butts are the most common form of litter in the world - in the USA alone, over 150 billion cigarette butts contribute to litter nationwide. Texas A&M Corpus Christi students who participated in past campus clean-up events have noticed that the majority of cleanup efforts go towards picking up cigarette butts. As a campus that is adjacent to Corpus Christi Bay, Oso Bay, and marshlands, WE NEED PROPER DISPOSAL AVENUES OF CIGARETTE BUTTS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION. Lit cigarette butts that are thrown on the ground also have the potential to cause fires and endanger our local wildlife (blue crabs, blue herons, piping plover, various fish species, fox, coyote, opossums, skunks, raccoons, cats, etc) who could accidentally ingest these hazardous materials. TAMUCC has yet to solve these local environmental health and safety problems with a simple solution- installing cigarette recycling receptacles on campus.

To put an end to this issue, the student population of Texas A&M Corpus Christi demands that the university:

• Implement disposal options (cigarette butlers) at the gazebos along the campus trails & at smoking zones on campus, including metal Butt-Out bins and ash receptacles. See potential receptacle options below. 
• Make these bins easily identifiable, hygienic, and aesthetically acceptable, and place them in easy-to-access areas listed above. 
  Ideally, TAMUCC can introduce educational programs, such as Bin Your Butt, to raise awareness about the determinants of cigarette butt littering with the implementation of these bins. 
• Research recycling programs to partner with to redirect this litter towards environmentally beneficial initiatives, such as TerraCycle. 

Please sign to keep our campus and the surrounding areas clean and safe. TAMUCC must take responsibility for the environmental dangers that this waste causes on campus. Read this fact sheet and the information below for more details on the dangers of improper cigarette butt disposal and share it with your fellow students. 

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More Information About the Dangers of Cigarette Butts: Proper disposal of cigarette butts is essential to the health of the environment due to the toxic chemicals they contain, including cadmium, arsenic and lead. When butts get washed into lakes or storm drains, the water can become contaminated with those chemicals. Cigarette butts contain cellulose acetate – a plastic – and are not readily degradable. Each cigarette butt takes up to 1.5 years to break down. Cigarette butts can also be eaten by animals mistaking them for food, and on a campus with cats, skunks, and raccoons, this is a huge danger. Through stormwater drains, cigarette butts enter the ocean and in seawater, they take up to 5 years to break down. 

Potential Receptacle Options: TerraCycle Cigarette Waste Recycling Receptacles