April 22nd is Earth Day, but that’s only one day in a year. Do you recycle or have been thinking it’s time to do something Green? You may not know this about me, but I recycle from time-to-time. I don’t consider myself a tree-hugger or a green activist, but I try to do at least one thing to save the environment and so I recycle drink containers (plastic, glass, and aluminum) even when they don’t have a CRV value. (CRV = California Redemption Value.)
It feels great afterwards and I feel like I’m doing my part no matter how small.
CalRecycle.ca.gov)
Start Them Young
Last year as I was walking from the school bus stop, my neighbor told me a story of her 8 year old daughter taking the initiative to recycle at home, and she thought she would probably love it if she took her to a Recycling Center then let her pick out something with the money to reward her efforts. What a great idea! You can never be too young to learn something like that.
My Tips: How to Recycle
As someone that does this quite often (or when I can’t stand them taking up space in my garage any longer), I enthusiastically shared my tips with her.
- Research online or call around for “Local Recycling Centers” and check their schedules. Some are closed one day during the week (because they’re open on the weekends) and they’re closed an hour during lunch time.
- Designate an area in the garage for recycling. Once you start, you’ll see how fast it accumulates. I usually wait until I accumulate at least 5 large trash bag full before I take them in.
- Crush the bottles and cans to take less space.
- Bring gloves. For obvious reasons, I don’t like to touch sticky cans or bottles.
- Drain the liquids but keep the caps. (You’ll get dinged if your bottles aren’t dry). You don’t get dinged for caps.
- If you hate standing in line as me, try to avoid peak times. Also, when my kids were younger, I tried to park the closest spot so I can just keep the windows down and not take them out of the car. You can’t do that if it’s peak times.
- Something to think about: they pay more for aluminum cans, but bottles weigh more than cans. That’s why I do them all.
- You’ll get a voucher. There are a lot of locations to choose from. I go to the one in the Stater Bros parking lot so I can apply it towards groceries but you can just cash it.
“Recycling is one of the easiest and most beneficial ways we can all help the environment. Sadly, only about 30% of PET plastic bottles get recycled. For recycling to work, we all have to do our part.”
Arrowhead’s ReBorn Bottles
Last year Arrowhead introduced a new ReBorn Bottle that’s made with 50% recycled plastics – material that can be recycled again and again, so there is no end to its usefulness, but they need our help. They need us to recycle more so they can reuse the plastics. Currently, there isn’t enough recycled plastic available for Arrowhead to make 100% rPET bottles.
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What’s one thing you can do tomorrow to save Earth? Will you share this message with a friend or family?
Disclosure: This post is sponsored by Arrowhead Waters and may contain affiliate links. All opinions are my own. All images copyrighted and used with permission. Your recycling experience may differ.