The average American creates an average of 4.3 pounds of trash a day, estimates Population Education. You can limit the amount of trash your household creates by recycling. Learn tips for recycling at home to reduce your households burden on landfills and the environment.
Every household can make a difference by recycling and minimizing their impact on already overburdened landfills. These tips for recycling at home include easy tips for beginners and advanced recycling ideas for the die-hard environmentalist.
Tip 1 – Identifying Recyclables
The first step to recycling is identifying what items are recylable. Some recyclable items are easy to identify because they contain a recycle symbol or PET code on them. But these items are not the only recyclable items. You can recycle food scraps, gray water, Styrofoam, paint, motor oil, old furniture, appliances and more. Many products that are not recyclable can be reused to keep them out of landfills.
Tip 2 – Make a Home Recycling Center
Everyone in the household is more likely to recycle items if it is easy. With a busy lifestyle it can be hard to remember what items are recyclable and let’s face it, sometimes we are lazy and it is easier to simply toss an item in the trash. If you make recycling easy, you are more likely to do it. Recycling is much easier when you set up a home recycling center. A home recycling consists of separate labled bins in the house for different recyclable products. In your kitchen, place a bin for cans, bottles and other items that can be emptied into your outdoor recycle collection container for pickup by your waste collection provider, a bin for your compostable items and a bin for plastic shopping bags. In your office, place a bin for paper, a bin for styrofoam packaging and a bin for old batteries. Set up a shelf in your garage for storing motor oil, paint and old electronics.
Tip 3 – Composting
Don’t throw away food scraps and yard trimmings. Instead, make valuable compost to fertilize your garden. Make a compost pile in your backyard by combining 50 percent carbon rich materials such as dirt or dried leaves with 50 percent nutrient rich materials such as fresh grass clippings and vegetable scraps, in a compost bin. Mix the materials thoroughly. Remix the pile each time you add your fruit and vegetable scraps, pet waste and yard trimmings. Keep your compost pile covered with a tarp at all times. Your compost is ready to spread in the garden when all of the items have biodegraded and the compost smells and looks like dirt.
Article by Rose Kivi