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America Recycles Day is November 15

Submitted by Lorene Bartos, UNL Extension Educator

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Happy “America Recycles Day.” This day is set aside to bring awareness recycling is important and saves energy, resources and money. What is your family doing to help the recycling effort? Recycling doesn’t end with taking items to the recycle bins or in the recycle containers to be picked up at the curb. To complete the recycling loop families should buy items made from recycled products.

What can your family do to get involved? First of all look in your trash. What do you find? Are there cans, bottles, plastic containers, magazines, newspapers, etc.? If so, start right there. Make a recycling plan for your family. Perhaps you want to start by recycling only a couple things.

You can start when you do the family shopping, Shop S.M.A.R.T (Save Money and Reduce Trash). As you shop, watch the packaging. Try to purchase items that have less packaging or packaging made from recycled products.

Secondly, buy items made from recycled products. Glass beverage containers are used to make roads, marbles, and decorative tiles to name a few items. Plastic bottles are used to make clothing, carpet, park benches, goggles, deck material, and fiber for filling jackets. Recycled steel and aluminum cans go into new cars, appliances, bikes cookware and much more. Challenge your family to look for recycled items when shopping.

Recycling is easy as there are many drop-off sites in the local area. Check the phone book or Lincoln Recycling Office Web site to find the site nearest your home.

Recycling is easy and simple to do:

• Put newspapers in a paper sack, inserts and ads can be included.
• Flatten cardboard boxes and paper board (i.e. cereal and food packaging boxes).
• Clean, rinse and flatten aluminum and tin cans - you can leave the labels on.
• Food and beverage glass - clean, green and brown. Rinse and remove lids, separate by color in drop-off bins.
• Plastic bottle and containers #1 thru #5 can be recycled at drop-off sites. Some curb-side recyclers may take other plastics. Remove lids and flatten.
• Put mixed paper which includes magazines, office and school paper, telephone directories and unwanted mail (always remove or mark out addresses) in a paper bag or box to collect.
• Aluminum cans can be taken to a buy-back center.

Remember these simple tips to starting a recycling program at your home or work.

• Before shopping make a list. Buy only what you need.
• Look at packaging, size and purchase the item with the least waste.
• Do the right thing with leftover products and packaging. Share, recycle, reuse.
• Take a look at your trash and reduce the amount going to the landfill by recycling.

As you do holiday decorating, shopping and traveling keep the environment in mind. Use electronic, no paper tickets, stay at hotels environmentally friendly and use energy efficient lighting and use reusable shopping bags when shopping.

Start today to make a difference. REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE and BUY RECYCLED