Before Elizabeth Wimbush, CAS, came to PPAI to become the Association’s director of sustainability and responsibility, she found herself upset with The PPAI Expo.
It felt like all over the convention center, the recycling wasn’t properly labeled to the standards she was used to in Canada. She noticed attendees dumping their unwanted stuff in any old bin. Who could know where it was going? Probably just a landfill, she assumed. She even had the thought that she might not come back to the industry’s biggest trade show in the future, until she brought the frustration up to a like-minded peer.
That trash, they said, was not just being thrown away, Wimbush’s friend noted. It was going behind closed doors, where it was all sorted. Food was sorted out from other trash. Different materials were sorted into what could be donated or sold together. Recycled material was sorted from any possible landfill. All with the effort (and in 2025’s case successfully so) toward a Zero Waste event. PPAI is still waiting to hear back on the results of whether it improved upon 2025’s achievement of diverted 91% of available waste from landfills.
- PPAI pays an advanced sort of the waste generated. As a result, additional teams are brought on-site to sort the waste into over 30 different streams of categories to avoid it ending up in a landfill.
- For proof, here is the commodity worksheet for The PPAI Expo 2025, breaking down all the event’s waste into categories.
On the Monday of The PPAI Expo Conference, interested attendees were able to peak behind those closed doors for a Sustainability Tour in collaboration with MGM, hosted by Kristen Royal, director of sustainable operations at MGM Resorts.
Elizabeth Wimbush, CAS
Director of Sustainability & Responsibility, PPAI
“I’m incredibly proud of not only our efforts at an organization level, but those of our exhibitors and attendees in helping us improve how much waste is diverted from landfill at Expo, year over year,” Wimbush says. “In 2024, we hit 88% diverted, in 2025, 91% was achieved, and I have high hopes that we will see that number continue to climb thanks to the collaborative efforts of everyone involved. We want to thank our partners at MGM for their focus on this as well. Teamwork makes the dream work, right?”
It was more than just facts. Tour attendees saw firsthand the docks where trash was sorted and the intricate systems by which discarded materials are separated for different purposes and destinations. MGM’s plans for sustainability for events like The PPAI Expo are complex, involving data and planning and solutions and re-working new plans around materials, all leading toward circular possibilities. According to Royal, that’s just smart business.
“I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you that we made money off of recycling,” Royal says. “And we are expanding how much materials we are making money off recycling, too. Waste is always a sign of inefficient design.”
RELATED: MGM Gives Behind-The-Scenes Sustainability Tour Of The PPAI Expo 2025
MGM’s Las Vegas facilities represent so many different functions (convention center, hotel, casino, restaurant and more) with so many daily visitors that the opportunities for diverting various materials are countless.
- Materials like glass and sand can generate profit for MGM because of their market value.
- Untouched food can be donated to area shelters through structured systems that get the food to the right places before it goes bad.
- Pig farms are utilized to avoid other food going to waste.
- Off-site recyclable plants are often less expensive than landfills in Las Vegas.
- 20,000 solar panels allow for the convention center to turn the lights on during the day with 90% solar. The building essentially operates as its own utility provider when it comes to solar, having mostly divested from the electrical grid.
6,700 Water Bottles Saved And Other Sustainability Facts
You’d be forgiven for coming to The PPAI Expo and not focusing entirely on its sustainability bonafides. There’s plenty of areas the Association is looking to improve, but there’s still plenty to be proud of when you come back and think about what you were a part of.
- Water refill stations were conveniently located throughout the show floor and Mandalay Bay, and PPAI provided free reusable water bottles provided by Koozie Group.
- Those water bottles were refilled just under 6,700 times, potentially avoiding the purchase of thousands of single-use water bottles.
- MGM has reduced water intensity by 37% since 2007, with 75% of water returned to Lake Mead.
- 2026 marked the third anniversary of PPAI’s circularity initiative recycling lanyards.
- Show materials, including the directory, used FSC-certified, responsibly sourced paper.
