Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

More Green Recycling Tips: Remember the Bag | Foiled Again | Green Your Gadgets | Electronics Recycling | Textbooks

Remember the Bag

Whether you've made your own sacks from recycled t-shirts or purchased totes that support a good cause, the reusable bag is a shopping must-have. Amassing a collection of eco-friendly bags is the easy part - remembering to bring them every time you go to the store can be tricky.

Be prepared for spur-of-the-moment sprees by storing extra canvas or hemp bags in your car, bike basket, and office cubicle.
Stash a small reusable bag in your purse or briefcase so that if you decide to swing by the farmers' market on your lunch hour, you won't have to juggle fruit to avoid the ol' plastic bag.

Foiled Again

Energy bars are convenient, sure, but what about the 800 million wrappers discarded each year? Now they and other selected junk can be sent to, TerraCycle, a company that's making big business out of household garbage.

Collect your wrappers, juice pouches, and plastic yogurt containers, send them to TerraCycle and see them reincarnated as purses, backpacks, and planter pots on the shelves of Target and Home Depot.
To participate, sign up for a specific program on TerraCycle's website. The company will provide you with postage-paid collection bags.
For every wrapper, juice pouch, and yogurt container received, TerraCycle makes a donation to the school, charity, or nonprofit organization of your choice.

Green Your Gadgets - Give 'Em Back

Congressional-watchdog agency GAO published a report on high-tech toxic trash exports and Greenpeace released its ninth annual Guide to Greener Electronics. Refer to these when choosing your digital technologies.

Some companies have established take-back programs, collecting their own products and can turning them into new gadgets. So opt for purchases from companies (like Nokia, the high-scorer in Greenpeace's latest report) ready to take back what they sell.
Unwanted devices from manufacturers without these programs can be brought to Best Buy stores.

Fast Fact: Americans toss out more than 100 million cell phones every year.

Fast Fact: Less than a fifth of obsolete computers are reused or recycled. Find a responsible recycler for your old PC or Mac at www.computertakeback.com.

Go Postal

The U.S. Postal Service is launching a free, recycle-by-mail program. In 10 regions, you can use free envelopes to mail back inkjet cartridges, PDAs, Blackberries, digital cameras, iPods and MP3 players - without having to pay for postage.

Recycle Textbooks

From forest to landfill, the book-publishing industry emitted about 12.4 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2006.

Resize that carbon footprint by opting for used textbooks. Bookbyte.com, Campus Book Swap, and Buy Used Textbooks offer opportunities to buy and sell books.
Want to your purchasing power to do double duty? Pick up that required copy of The Catcher in the Rye from Better World Books and your money will help fund literacy programs worldwide. Better World Books also accepts donations of "no-value" books; they've already saved 6,500 tons of books from landfills.

Go back to: Alternatives to Wrapping Paper | Recycle Old Clothes | Freecycle | Recycle Old Eyeglasses | Reuse Old Bottles