ecoPharmacist

Recycling tips

To add to my previous chat on recycling, here are some more recycling tips to make the habit easier!

Buy recycled paper and print on both sides. When using paper in the home or office, print on both sides of the sheet and recycle the paper when you are finished. By recycling one ton of paper, you can save 17 trees, almost 7,000 gallons of water and more than three cubic yards of landfill space.

Recycle your outdated technology. According to EPA, Americans throw out two million tons of e-waste each year. Avoid adding to that waste by recycling your old technology. Check with your local waste management company to find out your options for disposing of electronics and appliances. There are safe options and many areas have a neighborhood clean up days that gives free disposal dates once or twice a year.

Make recycling bins readily available. Make sure your home and office are outfitted with recycling bins for paper, plastic and metal. Keep them out in the open and label them appropriately. Sometimes the convenience factor is all that is needed.

Recycle your empty ink and toner cartridges. Almost eight cartridges are thrown out in the United States every second of every day. That’s almost 700,000 cartridges per day.

Buy remanufactured ink and toner cartridges. Each remanufactured cartridge keeps approximately 2.5 pounds of metal and plastic out of landfills and saves about a half gallon of oil. I recently learned you can refill ink cartridges at Costco of all places!

Recycle old magazine or newspapers lying around the home or office. When finished reading the newspaper, or your favorite magazine, either leave it for someone else to read or recycle it. Many have chosen to use online newspaper or magazine subscriptions now. That makes for an even better option to protect the environment.

Look for the recycled option in all the products you buy. It’s not just paper that is recycled.

Buy rechargeable batteries. It takes 1,000 regular batteries to equal the lifespan of one rechargeable battery. When you are discarding your batteries, recycle them.

Purchase rewritable CDs, DVDs and thumb drives, or any other memory devices, so that you can reuse them from project to project.

Reuse your morning coffee cup. Or better yet, buy a mug to avoid the waste caused by throwing away the paper or Styrofoam. Styrofoam has been banned in many areas, and hopefully that trend will continue.