Can This be Recycled? 

We thought we would talk about ”Can this be recycled?”

Personally, I have a hard time with all of the numbers for recycling, and after all of these years, I just discovered that recycling of pizza boxes is a huge NO, even though they are cardboard. Reason - , because the boxes have food/grease stains. Oh my gosh Chris Kuknyo of Patriot Disposal, I must apologize now for all of those pizza boxes that I have been so proud of recycling. So when it comes to recycling, what do the numbers mean? Most containers are supposed to have a number between 1 and 7, but sometimes it can certainly be difficult to find those pesky numbers. The rule of thumb is, if there is no number, the container goes in the trash. Here is a list of what types of plastics are used for and what types of products:

1 - Used for water, soda, juice and shampoo bottles and peanut butter jars.

2 - Used for bleach containers, milk and water jugs, laundry detergent & cleaning products jugs.

3 - Used for medicine bottles.

4 - Used for grocery bags and plastic wrap.

5 - Used for food containers, tubs and plastic squeeze bottles.

6 - Used for styrofoam containers.

7 - Used for 5-gallon water and sport water bottles.

We all know we should recycle, and our county had some great curbside recycling, plus we have several drop off areas in town. But as with everything in life, we find ourselves sometimes stumped. Does this bottle in the trash or do I recycle? No matter where we live, we should be able to recycle these items: Aluminum cans, glass bottles, glass jars, empty aerosol cans, paper bags, cereal boxes, with the liner removed, newspapers, junk mail, magazines, catalogs, phone books, cardboard (no pizza boxes). We cannot recycle, batteries, soiled paper plates, plastic paper bags, grocery or dry cleaner plastic. We have several recycling centers in our area’ Yavapai Metal Recycling, Mattera Recycling, Sundog Ranch Road Recycling for glass, several Lions bins around town for newspaper and cardboard, many trash pick up companies recycle with special catch all bins for the homeowner and the City of Prescott has recycle bins that you can order.

Did you know that when you toss out one aluminum can you waste as much energy as if you’d filled the same can half-full of gasoline and poured it into the ground.

Did you know that Americans throw away enough glass bottles and jars every two weeks to fill the 1.350-foot towers of the former World Trade Center.

Did you know each year American throw away 25,000,000,000 Styrofoam cups, enough every year to circle the earth 436 times.