What are some examples of recyclable waste?

What can be recycled Sidewalk paper includes newspapers, magazines and mixed paper, cardboard (OCC), glass bottles and jars, rigid plastic products, metal containers, including tin, aluminum and steel cans, food waste, if your city has an organic product collection program. You can easily recycle paper and cardboard. In fact, they're one of the most recycled materials in New Jersey. They look like aluminum cans, but they are very different.

One difference is that they can be easily attached to magnets. Recycling them also helps to save a lot of energy in our environment. Any plastic bottle or container can be easily recycled. Have you ever wondered how to get rid of your microwave, printer cartridges, mobile phone or old clothes? Did you know that many items that we classify as “waste” can be recycled? It is estimated that only 3% of mobile phones are recycled, which is a waste of precious resources.

There are several mobile phone recycling programs where you can leave your old phones, including Mobile Muster. Plastic bags and other soft plastics cannot go to the recycling bin next to the sidewalk. For now, soft plastics should go to the container with the red lid until RedCycle works again. Reuse plastic bags as much as possible and replace them with reusable shopping bags.

We can all try to reduce the use of soft plastics as much as possible. The collection and processing of scrap metal reduces the ecological impacts of mining raw materials. NetWaste has a scrap contract that offers a collection service at most municipalities in the NetWaste area. Recycled magazines are important in the recycling process, since their high clay content is used to remove inks from paper before converting it into new paper products.

Plastics can often be confusing because there are many different types of plastics on the market and these different types cannot be mixed when recycled into new products. Items that cannot be recycled must be properly deposited in garbage cans or in the trash can to ensure that the environment is preserved and maintained. In addition, some products made from the same type of plastic cannot be recycled together because they are produced through different processes. Contaminations can quickly enter the recycling process when materials contaminated with food are recycled.

With a constant demand for aluminum cans, manufacturers can once again have an aluminum can on store shelves as a new can in as little as 60 days after it has been recycled. Most of the time, the list of unacceptable recycling items depends on the material used by recycling services in New Jersey. Colored plastics are less versatile for recyclers and therefore may have a lower price in the recycling market. The production of new cans from recycled aluminum saves 95% of the energy used to produce cans from ore, known as bauxite.

Many residential recycling programs in Maine collect several types of paper, such as cardboard, magazines, or junk mail, in one category. This program is supported by the New South Wales EPA's Waste Less, Recycle More initiative, funded by the waste tax. Broken or sharp objects should not be recycled, as they can damage the machine used for recycling. It's important to remember that every municipal recycling program is different, so not all of these materials are necessarily accepted where you live.

Vickie Zaidel
Vickie Zaidel

Freelance music maven. Gamer. Infuriatingly humble pop culture evangelist. Avid travel aficionado. Incurable tv maven. Lifelong internet nerd.