What kind of common metallic materials does your company recycle? Companies exist where different kinds of scrap metal can be recycled. Car batteries and other car parts can also be recycled. There are so...
There are so many good reasons to recycle. One reason is that recycling reduces our use of landfills and incinerators because there is less garbage. Recycling is great for our health because it removes harmful substances and pollution from the waste stream. Recycling also saves energy because new paper being made from old paper uses 60 percent less energy. Speaking of paper, recycling conserves our natural resources because we don't have to chop down as many trees. And last but not least, recycling saves money, money that we throw out in 100 percent reusable items such as glass everyday.
One material that many consumers aren't aware of when it comes to recycling is metal. Metals can be used over and over again just as paper and glass can. Ryan Morters works for All American Recycling, which is a part of Borders Brothers Recycling Company. They recycle scrap metal, batteries, and other miscellaneous car parts. Morters says that just about anything metal can be reused.
"We recycle aluminum, copper, brass, and stainless steel," Morters says. "We buy long iron and short iron. Short iron is anything four feet and under. Long iron is anything over four feet. We buy car batteries, alternators, starters, transitions, cord converters, and many other miscellaneous car parts."
One of the biggest problems that consumers have when it comes to recycling is not being sure if their items are recyclable. In those situations, Morters says that it can't hurt taking the materials in anyway.
"People usually bring in whatever material they want to recycle," Morters explains. "If you don't know if it is recyclable, take it to someone, and most likely it can be used again somewhere. We get a lot of our metal from construction sites. Construction sites are mostly going to be copper wire. However, copper metal is in telephone wire as well. You can extract metals from lots of things."
"You can donate your batteries, but most people come and sell them," Morters adds. "We pay about a dollar a piece for regular car batteries. The bigger truck batteries are $1.50. It is a service to get rid of unwanted car parts. Some wrecking yards will come into the shop, and they will bring a lot of batteries from cars. They will also strip down whatever else they can off the cars."
"They will try to get everything that is valuable off before they have to crush it because they can get more money that way," he continues. "It is very much a market economy. Whatever you can get the most money for is what you are going to recycle. Prices fluctuate in the market. What we are paying now for batteries, we might not be able to pay next month. It all depends on demand."
"Right now a lot of demand is going down for iron and stuff like that," Morters says. "A lot of these mills will be closing. They will be closed for about two to three months for their overhaul. The prices will go down because of that since they are not turning the metal."
