| People
helping people
It seems unlikely the Blest Company (info@blest.co.jp) will soon manufacture enough machines to afford every family the opportunity to return polyethylene, polystyrene, and polypropylene back to oil, water, and carbon. Currently, we have the unhealthy option of giving our plastic a one-way ticket to a landfill where, alone, it would remain mostly inert for generations. If landfills contained only plastics, the hazards would be minimal. Unfortunately, since the 1940s, we’ve been dumping all manner of highly toxic chemicals. The Environmental Protection Agency allows small amounts of hazardous waste in any landfill, and landfill liners eventually leak, polluting the ground-water. (Lee, G. F. and Jones-Lee, A., “Association between Hazardous Chemical Sites and Illness,” Report of G. Fred Lee & Associates, El Macero, CA, January (2007). http://www.members.aol.com/annejlee/HazChemSites-Illness.pdf Some of us are rather excited about keeping recyclable items out of landfills! Idaho County Recycling (ICR) collects rinsed plastic bottles and/or jugs numbered 1 through 7. All bottles/jugs must be empty, rinsed, and without lids. The bottle/jug natural opening must be smaller than the bottom of the container, because plastic containers with larger openings require more (unrecyclable) resin to maintain that shape. Labels may remain attached. These containers are repurposed for many people-friendly items. Some of our volunteers have enjoyed using “B2P” (Bottles to pens) – ball-point pens. Each ICR recycling site features two bins. Our “commodities” bins have three sections. The far-right-hand-side section is for collecting recyclable plastic bottles/jugs. In the plastic bottle/jug section, the following are considered prohibitive contaminates: Plastic containers larger than 1.5 gallons in size; metal handles or other metal components; any container that was used to contain paint, thinners, automotive products, hydrocarbons, fuel, pesticides or herbicides. We greatly appreciate customers who discard bottle lids themselves, as these lids become a safety hazard to workers at Lewis Clark Recyclers, Inc. in Lewiston. In Cottonwood we also collect empty prescription medicine bottles with caps, helping you donate them to veterinarians and allowing them to minimize costs for animal medicines. If you can fit your recyclable items into a brown paper bag or cardboard box, we can also recycle the bag or box and cut down on the number of plastic bags that cannot be recycled. Thank you. |
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