Sorting

Here, the waste that wasn't sorted at curbside is loaded onto a conveyor belt and separated into things that are recyclable and things that aren't (non-hazardous solid waste). Hazardous waste, such as poisons, paints, or chemicals, that shouldn't have been thrown into the waste stream, is removed and taken to the Recycle City Hazardous Waste Center. Then, anything that isn't hazardous and can't be reused or recycled is sent to the solid waste landfill.

Reusable or recyclable waste is sorted into separate bins—newspaper, other paper and cardboard, aluminum cans, tin and steel cans, glass, and plastic. Yard trimmings are separated out to be made into compost. After everything's sorted, trucks from different companies take away the recyclables and make them into new products.

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Paper, newspaper and cardboard

Even though paper and paper products can be easily recycled, they still are the most common items in any trash can. Paper and paperboard makes up nearly 40 percent of the waste stream.

So which kinds of paper are recyclable? Cardboard, newspaper, and high-quality papers (like paper for notebooks, copiers, computers, letterheads, and envelopes) can all be recycled. Different kinds of paper—like newsprint and high-quality white paper—are sorted into separate piles because they are processed differently. Recycle City collects just about everything made out of paper that hasn't been coated with plastic, printed with metallic ink, or soiled by food.

Paper is recycled by shredding it into small pieces and mixing it with water. The mixture is beaten into mush, called pulp, that flows onto a moving screen where most of the water is taken out. Wood or paper fibers remain and the fiber is pressed through rollers that squeeze out more water. It is then dried in a steam-heated dryer. The result is recycled paper.

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Glass

You can recycle many types of glass. Glass food and beverage containers can be reused and recycled an infinite number of times. (In fact, only light bulbs, ceramic glass, dishes, and window glass can't be recycled. Dishes and ceramic glass can be sold at garage sales, given to someone else, or donated to charity or a community warehouse.)

Glass is made from soda ash, sand, and lime. If it's thrown away, it stays there indefinitely because glass never breaks down into its original ingredients. To be recycled, glass is sorted by color, crushed into small pieces, and melted down into a liquid. Then, it is molded into new glass containers. Sometimes recycled glass is used to make insulation and road-construction materials.

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Aluminum

In many parts of the country—maybe in your area—recycling aluminum cans is a profitable activity. There is an established market for recycling them, making it easy for most people to participate. And, because they house some of the country's most popular beverages, such as colas and other soft drinks, you can find them almost everywhere.

Aluminum is made from bauxite, an ore that must be mined from the earth. It doesn't decompose or break down, so an aluminum can will always be an aluminum can—until someone recycles it! When recycled, aluminum is melted down and reshaped into new cans and other items. Making new aluminum cans from old ones requires only five percent as much electricity as it does to make new cans from bauxite!

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Other Metals

It makes good sense to recycle valuable resources such as metals. Why? Metals are easier for people to recover and reuse than to mine from the earth.

Tin-coated steel cans, such as soup and fruit cans, are made of iron ore and tin, which are non-renewable resources. They are the product of geological processes that take millions of years to complete. Once these metals are gone, they are gone forever.

These types of cans require a different recycling process than aluminum cans. As a result, steel cans may not be accepted by some recycling companies. If they're not recycled, cans made of these metals eventually rust and break down, but throwing them away is a waste of valuable resources.

To be recycled, these cans are put into a huge container with holes in the bottom and then dunked in a caustic (acid-like) solution to dissolve the tin from the cans. Then, the steel cans are washed and sold as high-grade steel. The dissolved tin is made into bricks which are sold to companies that need tin to make more cans or other products.

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Plastic

Plastic is made of petroleum, a non-renewable resource. It makes up almost 10 percent of waste stream's weight, but takes up almost 20 percent of its space (or volume). About half of plastic waste comes from packaging. The rest comes from all kinds of goods, such as computers, radios, disposable razors, and toys.

A piece of plastic that is thrown away will stay the same for many, many years. Today, only about five percent of plastic is being recycled, primarily plastic soft drink bottles and milk jugs.

In your house, you can find two types of easily recyclable plastics.

The plastics from soft drink containers (Plastic #1, known as polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, for short) are used to make fiber, structural molding, and more containers.

Milk jug plastics (Plastic #2, called high-density polyethylene, or HDPE) can make bottles, toys, pipes, crates, and other products.

A mixture of these plastics goes into making garbage cans, park benches, plastic "lumber," manhole covers, and even railroad ties.

Separating plastic by type for recycling helps manufacturers produce higher quality recycled products. (An easy way to tell which plastic a container is made of is to look on the bottom for a number inside the recycle symbol.)

To be recycled, plastics are either shredded or melted down and then used to make new plastic products.

Although #1 and #2 plastics are the easiest ones to recycle, there are other types of plastics as well that will be more commonly recycled in the future.

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Wood

Almost all wood can be reused in some way. People throw wood away in a variety of conditions, and it can be reused or recycled differently depending on its condition. Wood that's in good condition or is especially valuable, like oak, can be resold at places like Recycle City's Community Warehouse.

About 40 percent of wood recovered from buildings that are torn down can be reused in the same way new wood is used. Wood that is in pretty bad shape can be remilled and remanufactured into things like furniture and flooring. Even wood that's in terrible condition can be recycled by chopping it into fine pieces and making it into things like particle board.

However, painted wood is hard to recycle because paint often contains lead, which is a toxic metal. Sometimes painted wood is chopped into a fine mulch and used as filler in construction. Researchers are looking for other ways to reuse it, so it doesn't have to go into landfill.

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Yard trimmings

When you mow the lawn or rake up leaves, the yard trimmings may not look like much, but they weigh a lot. In the Recycle City waste stream, yard trimmings only make up about 8 percent of the actual size of the waste stream, but they represent over 16 percent of its weight.

At the Recycle City Materials Recovery Facility, yard trimmings are separated from the waste stream for large-scale recycling. Some yard trimmings are made into mulch or wood chips. (Some landfills or materials recovery facilities have machines at the same location that turn wood into chips.) The rest is turned into a natural soil additive, called compost, that is eventually used in landscaping, gardening, or farming.

Yard waste can be collected and composted by an entire community, as a school project, or by you in your own backyard.

When you add compost to your garden at home, you can improve soil texture, keep weeds from growing, increase soil's ability to absorb air and water for better plant growth, and decrease erosion. With compost, you also reduce the need to use chemical additives and pesticides.

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