A day at the PNE isn't generating the kind of waste it used to. Chris Olsen shares some of the PNE's recycling ideas we can all learn from.

The Cheyenne Coffee company at the PNE is an award winner, and not just for great coffee. It's recognized as the "Most Sustainable Booth" at the Fair for its commitment to recycling.

"We compost all our grounds and recycle all our milk jugs (and) cream," said Cheyenne's Annie Martin.

Even the coffee cups are compostable.

This is Martin's fourth fair and she's seen many improvements in that short time.

"Every year it seems to be getting better and better. Now they have recycling bins for all the pop bottles and stuff," she said.

The PNE has a sustainability committee, and one of its first initiatives was to place those containers for bottles and cans across the fairgrounds.

This year, it came up with the idea of composting leftover food waste starting with the largest vendor.

"That's a program we hope to expand next year and move further through the site," PNE spokesperson Peter Male said.

Other changes are harder to notice. If you watch a Super Dog show, the lighting is now LED, which uses a tiny fraction of the power of the old lights

"We examine every little facet of the operation," Male said.

At Steve O's Pizza, Wesley Owens says his staff has really bought into the recycling idea. They fill up several blue bags a day.

"We figure we are saving at least a cubic metre of space in the landfill," Owens said. That's per day!

Steve O's Pizza recycles all the cardboard its ingredients come in, but Owen would like to see the cardboard boxes he hands out recycled by customers too.

"It's really up to the customer what they do with them," he said. "I see a lot of them in the garbage."

Male says that's an area the PNE may look at in the future.

'It's an evolution," he said. "We have an awful lot of people here. Some of our concessionaires have thrust a lot further, a lot faster than others."

That's why the PNE gives out awards like the one Cheyenne coffee won -- to encourage others to do more.

The money collected from the recycled bottles and cans is returned to the PNE's sustainability committee to fund future recycling ideas.

With a report from CTV British Columbia's Chris Olsen.