Lately, as you wander through the grocery store aisles it doesn’t take long before you notice that some shelved items seem to be jumping out at you.   Many beverages, yogurts, snack foods, toddler meals, pet foods, cleaning and personal care products seem to be screaming, “Look at me!”  Glossy, vividly colored, labeled items do stand out from the crowd, but are they wreaking havoc in our recycling streams?

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Boats everywhere are being pulled out of storage, unwrapped, and set back into the water. Unwrapped? Yes. For those of you who are not boaters, shrink wrap goes way beyond the kitchen- it is used to keep stored boats in good condition. But what happens to all this shrink wrap after it has been used? (more…)

April 22, 2010 marked the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. By attending the 2010 New York City Earth Day event, it was obvious we have come a long way since Earth Day’s beginnings as a protest to raise environmental awareness.

Earth Day NYC 2010

Americans dispose of billions upon billions of paper, plastic, and foam cups. This year over 58 billion paper cups and 25 billion polystyrene foam cups will pass through our hands and end up in landfills. While the United States is still the world’s largest culprit of disposable cup waste, growing nations like China and India are fast catching up. It’s a cup carrying, cup dumping world! (more…)

Just Zip It. Zipper-type plastic storage bags have hundreds of uses and are fast becoming the quintessential storage solution for households and businesses. Foods, electronic parts, garden soils, and even crime scene evidence end up packaged in these convenient, storage bags. Although millions of these bags are used daily, recycling used zipper-type plastic bags is not so easy. (more…)

Plastic as a Recycling Foundation

Is the time right for MRF World to take plastics more seriously? Should plastics be at the forefront of curbside recycling? Just as co-mingling of recyclables has made collection at curbside easier, the co-mingling of information on recovered materials may provide some answers. Trust me. We are not mixing apples and oranges; the markets do share some interesting parallels. (more…)