Recycling half of your household waste can save 2,400 pounds of CO2 per year. Here are some of the many things that can be recycled:
Paper—Newspaper, magazines, catalogs, phone books, bulk mail, junk mail, office paper, computer paper, envelopes, gift wrapping paper, cardboard, food boxes, shoeboxes, paper towel and toilet paper tubes, paper egg cartons.
Plastic—Plastic that bears the 1 or 2 plastic resin codes, also called SPI codes. SPI stands for Society of the Plastics Industry (think water/soda/juice bottles, milk jugs, containers etc.)
Yard Waste—Leaves and grass account for about 8 percent of the waste discarded to landfills in California. But in a landfill they generate significantly more greenhouse gas than they would in compost piles or bins.
Glass & Metal— Glass bottles, Steel and Aluminum Cans—Beverage cans, food cans, aerosol cans. Clean Aluminum Food Packaging—Pie plates, dinner trays, foil etc.
Don't know where to recycle motor oil, tires, & batteries? Check these websites. http://www.zerowaste.ca.gov/3Rs/What.htm, http://www.obviously.com/recycle/guides/common.html
Link: http://www.obviously.com/recycle/guides/common.html
Solution Type: Habit
Media
alorenk says :
I live where people have pushed this for a long time, so good services. The founder of our local electronic recycling service just got the local Businesswoman of the Year award. Please include encouraging recycling in your commitment, in whatever way fits your interests and style.
I don't personally like the commingled recycling, having been trained early to seperate/deal with my cans etc...also always somewhat suspicious of big and centralized solutions as losing some effeciency and accountability. But know it does up the tonnage reclaimed, and it is what my garbage collector offers.
So it makes me really happy when I can reuse containers and otherwise lower my output of even recyclables. Read a hair care article years ago saying most shampoos are better for your hair when watered down to half strength. Can walk to store and fill my bottle from bulk shampoo dispensers (also good to change your shampoos once in a while).
Posted 12/29/08 at 10:40 PM
Wolf says : amazing new company called Recycle Bank...get paid to recycle! http://www.recyclebank.com/
Posted 08/23/08 at 05:36 PM
Rotkapchen says : Work with your local waste management provider to increase the recyclables and to help with promotions to encourage others to participate. Likewise, work to INCREASE hauling costs for non-recyclables. Worked like a charm in Seattle years ago (http://www.seattle.gov/util/About_SPU/Garbage_System/History_&_Overview/HISTORYOF_200312051508445.asp)
Posted 07/30/08 at 08:40 PM
ktnmunchkin says :
Our town has "single stream" recycling. This means that we use a BIG trash toter and just dump everything recyclable into it. The sorting is done later. This has increased recycling in our town dramatically. We recycle more this way than we did when we had to sort, and we thought we were doing a lot of recycling THEN! Now, the trash toter is much smaller than the recycling one, and you have to pay for overages and special overage bags.
I wish more towns offered this.
Posted 05/28/08 at 10:35 AM
Wolf says : seriously, it's amazing how much fewer trips to the trash you have to take when you recycle. www.earth911.org has this cool feature where you can search by zip or by what type of item you're trying to recycle. Just click on the recycle link on the top right of their page.
Posted 09/14/07 at 12:50 PM
BuildGreen says : The average American household throws out 35 pounds of garbage a week! That's five pounds of garbage each day! My girlfriend and I started recycling everything we could and instead of taking out the garbage two to three times a week, we only need to do it every two weeks or so. We use our old paper grocery bags to collect the recycling and we also don't need to buy trash bags as often.
Posted 09/14/07 at 12:38 PM