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Although it does require you to make a small lifestyle change and the effort to be consistently more aware of what you throw away, recycling can be rewarding in a number of ways. It reprocesses old materials to be used as new again, thus freeing up the environment from pollution, minimizing landfills, and conserving energy and resources. Many different materials that are used on an everyday basis are recyclable, such as paper, glass, metal, plastics, and aluminum.
Paper
Nearly all types of paper can be recycled, as long as they are relatively clean and unstained. Newspapers and phone books are the most commonly recycled form of paper. Printer paper, notebook paper, junk mail, mailing envelopes, and magazines are also easily recyclable. Corrugated cardboard is acceptable as long as it is not coated with plastic. Also keep in mind that paper that is laminated or waxed cannot be recycled, and neither can stickers or tissue paper. Be sure to separate the different kinds of paper by wrapping them up in paper grocery bags or with newspaper twine.
Glass
Glass is another type of material that is commonly and easily recycled. Normally only bottled glass containers are recyclable, such as milk or Snapple bottles. Before you recycle a glass container, be sure to rinse the inside out with water so it will not develop an odor. It is not recommended that you put broken glass in a recycling bin, because that makes it difficult and dangerous to sort out. Other materials to avoid recycling are light bulbs and ceramics. You should not try to put the lids to the glass containers in glass recycling bins unless they are also made of glass. However, leaving the paper labels on the bottles is perfectly all right to do.
Metal
Many metal containers are recyclable. This includes soup cans (as long as they are rinsed out and have their labels peeled off), metal caps, lids, and steel, lead, and iron products.
Plastics
Every plastic container has a number printed on the bottom, in the center of the triangular-shaped arrow recycling stamp, to denote the different types of plastic that are used. Nearly all recycling facilities accept plastics stamped with #1 or #2, but numbers #3-#7 are not usually taken. Make sure to remove the caps to plastic containers before you recycle them, as they are usually made of a different kind of plastic.
Aluminum
Soft drinks, beer cans, and old cooking pots are common recyclable aluminum products. Many areas feature recycling centers that will pay you cash per pound of recyclable aluminum materials that you bring in.
How do I begin?
Nearly all major towns and cities feature curbside recycling programs, in which you separate different recyclable materials into certain containers the city provides you with and leave the containers out by the garbage cans. Recycling collection services will simply drive by to pick up those materials about once a week or so. If your town does not have curbside recycling programs, you can check the yellow pages for recycling centers near you—just look under “waste materials” or “recycling centers”. To decrease the amount of garbage you throw away, look into buying products in bulk packages. This will save you some money and you will have less packing materials to throw away. Recycling is a rewarding, environmentally friendly cause that will benefit you and everyone else—good luck!
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