{"id":5135,"date":"2017-09-15T07:00:31","date_gmt":"2017-09-15T11:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/?p=5135"},"modified":"2020-03-05T23:03:29","modified_gmt":"2020-03-06T04:03:29","slug":"365153-plastics-dos-donts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/365153-plastics-dos-donts\/","title":{"rendered":"365+#153:\u00a0Plastics \u2013 Do\u2019s & Don\u2019ts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Plastic items are light, easily cleaned, and often cheaper than cloth, wood, metal, or brick. Maybe the three pigs should have built their homes out of plastic. But, of course most plastics do not biodegrade easily or quickly which make them anathema to environmentalists like me. They can, however, be recycled.<\/p>\n

Conscientious citizens already know the basics of recycling and responsible municipalities usually provide curbside recycling to make it easy. So, problem solved? Almost. Communities differ in what they accept in curbside recycling so contact your local government for details. Here are some plastic recycling basics for the recently committed recycler and some strategies for the faithful but tired ones.<\/p>\n

BASICS:<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. \n
  2. Plastic bottles and jugs<\/strong>. Most curbside recyclers take plastic bottles and jugs (along with paper, glass, and cans). Good.<\/li>\n
  3. #1-#4 plastics<\/strong>. Some curbside recycling companies won\u2019t take #1-#4 unless it\u2019s a bottle, The number in the triangle is irrelevant. It has to do with their recycling machines and who they can sell the plastic to. Stores like Whole Foods<\/em> generally take #1-#4. (2020-2 update. Whole Foods<\/em> no longer accepts #1-#7 plastics including #5’s. See blog post #202<\/a><\/span> for other ideas.)<\/li>\n
  4. Don’t put curbside recyclables in a bag<\/strong>. The bag can gum up the recycling machinery.<\/li>\n
  5. \n
  6. Plastic bags<\/strong>. DO NOT<\/strong> put plastic bags in curbside recycling. It gums up the recycling machines, thus nimble fingered human beings have to deftly pick the bags off the recycling treadmills. Almost all grocery stores have a place to deposit plastic bags. Even better, ask for paper bags. Better yet, bring your own reusable cloth bags. Even with reducing your own plastic bag consumption, you\u2019ll probably end up with some plastic bags. For those of us who still get a print newspaper, you\u2019re bound to have plastic wrappers \u2013 unless you have a dog. \ud83d\ude09<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    STRATEGIES:<\/strong><\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Make a place<\/strong>. Maybe you have good intentions of recycling but, hey, the recycling can is outside and it\u2019s a cold day, or it creates such clutter in the house. Once you find a place and container (ideally near the kitchen) to put recyclables in, it makes turning an intention into a habit easier.<\/li>\n
    2. \n
      \"\"<\/a>

      bag of plastic bags<\/p><\/div>\n

      Pack your car<\/strong>. We dutifully collect all the plastics that cannot go in curbside recycling and store them in the basement \u2013 where they stay for too long, because Whole Foods<\/em> is not nearby. Now, once a bag is full of non-curbside plastics, we put it in the trunk of the car so we can drop them off when we\u2019re in the neighborhood. Procrastination is minimized. Besides, who\u2019s going to steal plastics bound for recycling?<\/p>\n

      What strategies have you devised to improve your recycling?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Plastic items are light, easily cleaned, and often cheaper than cloth, wood, metal, or brick. Maybe the three pigs should have built their homes out of plastic. But, of course most plastics do not biodegrade easily or quickly which make them anathema to environmentalists like me. They can, however, be recycled. Conscientious citizens already know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[52,6],"class_list":["post-5135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-process","tag-plastics","tag-recycling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5135"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5135\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6725,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5135\/revisions\/6725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.susanvogt.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}