CapriSun Drink Pouch Brigade - 3/10 update

I have shipped the remaining 2 boxes of the CapriSun pouches. The 1st box is weighed about 12 pounds while the 2nd box is a little more than 17 pounds.

1st box (red) shipped (weight: 12 lbs).

I've positioned the 2nd box this way so the remaining juices will drip down.

2nd box shipped (weight: 17 lbs)

CapriSun Drink Pouch Brigade - 2/11 update

Last month, I got another set of bags of drink pouches from my kids' school for our CapriSun Pouch brigade. I received 12 bags and worked on putting the pouches into the boxes so I can send them to Terracycle.

12 bags of CapriSun pouches

We used a copy paper box just like before to hold the pouches

Here is the 1st box filled with CapriSun pouches.

Filled 2 boxes on the left (white). I need some more pouches to fill the 3rd box (red).

Closer look on the 3rd box.

These 2 boxes are ready to be shipped.

Covered the boxes and attached the pre-paid UPS shipping labels.

I have dropped the two boxes to a nearby UPS store.

Just like what I said before, Terracycle pays for the shipping and they also pay the charity 2 cents per pouch.

Terracycle already received the 2 boxes above. I am currently working on finishing up the 3rd box (red). I'll post a couple more pictures once I'm done.

Joined a CapriSun Brigade

I wrote about recycling CapriSun pouches last June and when I found out about it, I tried looking for a brigade to join. Luckily, my children's school decided to start one and I volunteered in helping them out.

They have asked me if I could assist in packing the pouches and sending them to Terracycle. The school will receive $0.02 per pouch and plan to use the money to refurbish the school's playground (similar to their Paper Recycling activity).

As you can see below, the school was able to gather several bags of CapriSun pouches. There were 10 bags of pouches and I went through each bag flattening each pouch and putting them in the shipping box.

Here is how the pouches looks like on the shipping box.

I am using a box that store 10 reams of office paper to package the pouches.

I tried to squeeze as much as I could on the 1st layer and adding a 2nd layer of pouches.

Here is a filled box. I believe I was able to finish 5 bags just for this one box. I packaged it up, added a shipping label and dropped it at a UPS store but didn't weigh the box.

Shipping to Terracycle is free if you are a member of a brigade and you have an account on their site. You can just login to your account and print out a pre-paid UPS shipping label. Then, drop off the package to any UPS store and you can also track the package on the UPS website.

I was able to fill two more boxes with the remaining 5 bags. All of the boxes have been shipped and confirmed that they were received on by Terracycle. The boxes are a bit heavy... maybe around 8 to 10 pounds each. I should have weighed each one of them before shipping them out.

Lastly, I hope the school earns a lot from this recycling activity so they can make their school playground safer.

Paper Recycling - PaperRetriever.com

My kids school started a paper recycling drive during the start of the school year. They are trying to raise money to upgrade the school's playground. In order to do this, they obtained recycling bins from PaperRetriever.com to be able to collect the used paper products.

The recycling bin looks like this and has a picture of a dog carrying a paper. This is the back of the bin and shows a large sign that says "Make Every Page Count. Recycle Paper Here."

This is the front of the bin that shows "Local Fund Raising." To drop paper, you don't need to open the front covers since there are slots on the sides where you can drop the paper items/products.

There are 3 bins at the back of the school and the last time I walked by, I saw 1 bin is already full and the other 2 are about half-full.

The following items are accepted on the bins: Newspapers, Magazines, Office and School Papers, Shopping Catalogs and Mail.
This is the side of the bin where you can drop the paper items. It also lists the type of papers that are accepted (Phonebooks are not accepted). On the side of the paper list, it also list items that should not be included: Plastic, Glass, Metals and Trash.
The are also signs that can be seen around the school campus that directs where you can drop your used paper.
The school had a paper drive week last month and asked each student to bring used paper for recycling. The total weight of collected paper amounted to 6836 pounds. That is about 3 1/2 (short) tons of paper from about 600 students.

We contributed about 80 pounds of paper and old magazines for that week. The drive helped me clear out old bills, statements and magazines stacked in my home office. Most of my bills are now electronic ever since I switch paperless. Here is a previous post about paperless billing and it has the sign-up links for banks, utilities, etc.

One note though. I did shred those bills with confidential information before sending them to school (shredding helps in protecting your identity).

The school's paper drive is still ongoing. All of our junk mail and other paper products are now going to this drive. My regular recycling bin is a little lighter now since I don't put any paper there anymore.

UPS Recycling

I attended a virtual conference hosted by Information Week magazine a couple of weeks ago. The theme of the conference is "Green IT." I visited a virtual booth by American Power Corporation (APC), a worldwide company that makes UPS and found out that they also recycle.

So, what's a UPS? Some readers may ask. UPS stands for Uninterruptible Power Supply. This is a device that provides battery backup for computers in case there's a power failure. The UPS will give you some time (typically around 5 to 15 minutes) to be able to save anything that you are doing or until an auxiliary power (generator) is turned on.

APC placed this recycling link on their virtual booth and I had to check it out. I remember early in my career that we used APC branded UPS on one of our client sites.

On the website, they give people 4 options to trade, recharge, or recycle old UPS devices instead of throwing it away.

Option 1: Trade UPS - you can trade any brand of old UPS for a new one.

Option 2:Replacement Battery Cartridges - you can trade or replace your old APC UPS battery and they will dispose the old battery in an eco-friendly manner.

Option 3: Certified Pre-Owned - provides eco-friendly disposal of your old APC UPS device and you can buy an APC certified Pre-Owned UPS at a lower cost.

Option 4: Staples Eco-Easy Recycling Program - APC teamed up with Staples for recycling battery backups. You can bring your battery to any US Staples store for recycling. There's a $10 recycling fee (per piece) to cover the handling, transport, product disassembly and recyling.

Batteries, if improperly disposed, can harm the environment. Should you have any old UPS devices that are not being used, here's the recycling option for you.

Enjoy and happy recycling!

Ink and Toner Cartridge Recycling - Cartridge World

I found an Ink and Toner cartridge recycling bin at my local library. I have visited a couple libraries within my area and I also found bins like this. 

Here are some facts that I found about Ink and Toner cartridge recycling from the Cartridge World website:

• About 8 cartridges are thrown away in the United States every second.
• Every cartridge reused is one less cartridge thrown into our landfills
• It takes a gallon of oil to make a new laser cartridge
• In North America, over 350 million cartridges per year are discarded in our landfills, and that number increases by 12 percent annually
• Every remanufactured cartridge saves nearly 3 and 1/2 pounds of solid waste from being deposited in landfills
• Remanufacturing cartridges reduces pollution. Almost 90% of empty cartridges are incinerated or dumped in landfills
• 70 percent of used printer cartridges throughout the world are currently being thrown out
• It can take as long as 450 years for a cartridge to decompose in a landfill
• In one year, if the world's discarded cartridges are stacked end-to-end, they would circle around the Earth over three times.

The bins are part of a recycling program that is run by Cartridge World. They provide the bins to schools or non-profit organizations to help them raise money. 

Cartridge World has over 1600 stores worldwide. They can refill inkjet cartridges or remanufacture toner cartridges in their stores. Reusing printer cartridges helps saving the environment and with the tough economy, it can save you some money, too. You can visit their website to find a store near you.

Recycling Plastic Bottles - CNN Video

I just found this video about recycling plastic bottles to make new bottles. Very interesting...

Plastic Bag Recycling drop-off at Lowe's and ACME Markets

Here are a couple more of plastic bag recycling bins that I found at local stores in my area.

Shown below is the Plastic bag recycling bin found at Lowe's.

This is the bin that I saw at a local ACME store.

ACME is part of the SUPERVALU, Inc. chain of stores. According to their website, they have more than 2,500 stores (Albertsons, bigg's, Bristol Farms, Cub Foods, Farm Fresh, Hornbacher's, Jewel-Osco, Save-a-Lot, Shaw's/Star Market, Shop 'N Save and Shoppers). You might find a plastic bag recycling bin on a store near you.

Plastic Bag Recycling drop-off at Safeway

We dropped by Safeway a week ago and we saw that they have a recycling bin for Plastic Bags. We have a couple of Safeway stores in my area. Both stores used to be Genuardi's but it was renamed about a year or two ago. Genuardi's is also owned by the Safeway company.

I am not sure where else Safeway is big. We have visited California (in the San Francisco Bay area) before and saw several stores out there. I checked their website and I found out that they have 1,775 stores across the United States and Canada. The store count includes the following stores: Vons, Randalls, Tom Thumb, Genuardi's and Carrs.

Here's what the recycling bin looks like.

I had to take another picture because my son wanted to be part of it.

Recycling at Best Buy

I dropped by Best Buy last weekend to get a copy of Wall-E for my kids. I accidentally saw that they have a recycling bin near their door. Best Buy accepts several items for recycling - Cellphones, PDAs, Pagers, Compact Discs, Inkjet cartridges, Used Gift Cards and Rechargeable batteries. According to their sign, a portion of the proceeds are donated to charity.
If you do not have the recyclable item with you, you can bring home a postage-paid bag and use it to send your recyclable item.
Below are the bags that Best Buy provides for Inkjet and Cellphone recycling. Since it's already postage-paid, just put your recyclable item in it, drop it in the mail and you don't have to pay for anything.


(Disclaimer: I am not an employee of Best Buy and I do not own any of their shares. The details above are for informational purposes only.)

Cellphone Recycling - T-Mobile

We recently upgraded our cellphone through our service provider (T-Mobile). Included with the package are envelopes (shown below) for cellphone recycling or eCycling (electronic recycling).

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, "Recycling cell phones reduces greenhouse gas emissions, keeps valuable material out of landfills and incinerators, and conserves natural resources. Recycling just a million cell phones reduces greenhouse gas emissions equal to taking 1,368 cars off the road for a year."

Here's an informative video about cellphone recycling.

If you have no other use for your old cellphone, you can either drop it off at eCycling stations or mail it in at no cost to you. For more details about the drop off center locations or where to mail them, please visit the US EPA website.

Plastic Bag Recycling

Plastic bags can be recycled and brought back to the store where you got them. Most of the plastic bags that we have at home come from the grocery stores. If you examine the labels on the plastic bags, it is most likely that it has a note that says "Please return to a participating store for recycling." Below are plastic bags from Walmart and K-Mart that shows this note at the bottom of each bag.

Should you decide to recycle your plastic bags, look for bins that look like this. To find a drop-off location near your area, visit Earth911.com or PlasticBagRecycling.org

eScrip

We got this from our son's school - eScrip Recycling. From their website and as shown on the package mailer, they accept ink and toner cartridges, cell phones, laptops and Ipods. Part of what they earn on recycling is given to the school or any group having the program.

It's a good way to raise money for the school and the children will benefit on whatever the school buys with the raised money from the program.

Office Recycling

I went to a training facility last week and I found out that recycling is also being promoted at corporate offices.

Shown here are two recycling bins. The one on the left has a green lid with two holes (left hole = glass, right hole = plastic bottle). The blue bin on the right has a sign that says "Aluminum Cans Only."

This blue bin is in the same office and it says:

RECYCLE
COMPUTER PAPER ONLY

4 out of the 44

I mentioned on my previous post about the NY Times Recycling Resource that you'll be surprised on how many kinds of garbage that Japan has. There are 44 of them according to the slideshow. Here is a picture that I took at Narita airport in Japan that shows 4 out of the 44.

From the left: Newspaper/Magazine, PET Bottle (I guess this is plastic bottle), Bottle (glass), and Can.

NY Times Recycling Resource

I found this interesting NY Times area about recycling and I think it's very informative.

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/recycling_of_waste_materials/index.html

View the "How Does Japan Dumps Trash?" slideshow and you'll be surprised on how many types of garbage they have.

I'll continue on finding resources about recycling. I believe this is important to lessen the amount of garbage that are going in the land-fills.

Recycle!!!

Let's all do our part in saving our planet. Recycling is one way of doing it! I will try to find out resources about recycling and put them on this blog.

Please... please.... please.... recycle all items that can be recycled. If your city has a recycling program, please sign up.