WITH ALL THE NEWS we’re hearing about changes in recycling, it’s understandable to have questions. For this new column, we enlisted the help of Katrina Bussiere- Venhuizen, an ecomaine recycling education specialist, to answer your questions. Katrina is about as passionate as they come about reducing waste, increasing recycling rates, and ensuring that recyclable items don’t end up in the waste stream. So, to kick off the series we posed a question we’ve all had our minds. “Are the things I put in the recycling bin actually getting recycled!? The short answer is “Yes!”

The long answer is, “Yes, as long as you are putting the right stuff in the right bin.” If you live in a community served by single-sort recycling, (like ecomaine) that means cardboard, paper, rigid plastic containers labeled #1-7, glass and metal = the right stuff. If you are putting items in the bins that don’t belong, it wastes lots of time, money and risks the safety of the folks who work hard to sort out the recycling.

Some of the most common items recycling companies see in bins that shouldn’t be there include chip bags, propane tanks, holiday lights, grocery bags, shoes, diapers, wood and styrofoam — we see all these things in the wrong place on a daily basis.

When you recycle the right stuff, single-sort recycling facilities can easily sort the cardboard, the paper and the different types of plastic, etc. They are then baled and sent on train or truckloads to create new items both in the U.S. (which is where your cardboard, metal, glass and plastics end up if you’re an ecomaine community) and occasionally outside the country (which is where paper sometimes heads).

Wherever your recycling lands, it gets responsibly turned into new items, such as a carpet made from #1 plastic, example strawberry containers, to new egg cartons made from cardboard, or new bicycle parts made from your old soup cans.

Here are some other rules of thumb to help ensure that what you put in your recycling bin makes it to a second life.

1. Recycle paper only if you can rip it (an example of something you couldn’t rip is laminated paper).

2. Recycle items that are palm-sized or larger, as smaller items will slip through the cracks of the sorting process.

3. Finally, don’t recycle your dangerous, smelly, sharp or trash items. Just because you’ve put it in a bin doesn’t mean it disappears!

Unsure about a specific item? Check ecomaine.org for a list of recycling DOs and DON’Ts and download the ever-helpful ecomaine app, Recyclopedia! (an online database found in app stores as a free download or at ecomaine.org.)

Have a question you’d like to see us answer in the next issue? Email us at info@greenmainehomes.com. Happy recycling, friends!

This article first appeared in the Spring & Summer 2020 issue of Green & Healthy Maine HOMES magazine. Subscribe today!