Tag: plastics

You Don’t Get Paid To Recycle Bottles? Whaaat?

On By Michel McDonaldIn Green, RecycleLeave a comment

I am talking to a friend that I have known for many cycles.  We’ve been online buds since 1997 when I first got online and was using AOSmell going into the Astronet Chatrooms.

We are talking about recycling.  I was telling her about how much I get paid here in Bakersfield, CA for recycling cans as opposed to how much I get paid to recycle 2 liter bottles.  She lives in St. Louis, Missouri and she informs me that she gets money for recycling the cans but they don’t allow them to profit off of 2 liter bottles yet they charge her .05¢ on top of the regular cost to buy a 2 liter bottle.

This is just another example of how “the man” is trying to screw you out of your hard earned money.

This is what I asked her:

Mike:
ok just so I get my facts straight…

you can recycle 2 liter bottles but they don’t allow you to make any money? yet they allow you to make money from recycling cans correct?

and they make you pay for the blue recycling cans and make you recycle?

Susan:”
right you don’t get money from any plastics at all you can get money for cans it is like 30 cents a pound for cans but nothing for any plastics we have to have them recycled and picked up by the contracted trash company for the city. some cities don’t even get a choice

Are you listening America?  They don’t even give you a choice in some cities.  They charge you .05¢ for the bottles yet they don’t give it back to you.  That’s what the point of the California Redemption Value (CRV) is, that’s why they charge us the .05¢, so you will recycle it, so you may get your change back.

I was at the grocery store yesterday where I bought a 12 pack of diet Dr. Chill (a new albertson’s generic brand lol) and it was on sale for $2.67 which was the only reason I bought it in the first place then the total was over $3 and I was like what?  I thought it was $2.67 and she said CRV and she pointed on the screen that it shows .60¢ CRV charge.  That’s .05¢ per can.  Yeah, you are damned right I’m recycling that shit.

Recycling Numbers

On By Michel McDonaldIn GreenLeave a comment

Today we went to turn in our plastic to recycle and found out that different plastic containers have different numbers and they cannot all be recycled together.  See I never knew that.  I found this website that shows you what the difference is.

What do those recycling numbers mean?

I had all these different types of plastics.  I had clear soda bottles, milk cartons, yogurt containers etc. and they had to separate the clear bottles with the rest.  The clear soda bottles had the 1 on the bottom inside that little recycle symbol.  Those get you more money than the other ones which were 2 and up.

We had basically half number 1 and the rest were 2-6.  When the guy gave us the receipt it showed us how much each plastic cost.  The plastic with the 1 was a lot more than the rest.  I think it was $7 something for all the number 1’s but all the rest we got like .45 cents and that’s it and it was half  number 1 and the other half was all the rest and that rest was less money.  So basically it’s not even worth recycling the rest.

They basically told us that it’s a waste of time to save anything but the number 1 plastic as well as even paper.  The reason I am recycling isn’t for the money although it helps in today’s economy but also because those Brita commercials where they say like 30 minutes on a treadmill, forever in a landfill.  Those make me feel guilty for buying anything that comes in plastic or anything lol.  But, you know if they are so concerned with it then they will have a machine that goes through the trash cherry picking all the certain types of plastics and paper etc.  Darrin told me that he read in the newspaper that there is like a mountain of recycled paper that they are having trouble getting rid of, that’s why paper is so cheap to recycle.  That’s probably also why the plastic that isn’t number 1 is cheap.

I’m not saying to not recycle because the CRV items like the soda bottles/water bottles and soda/beer cans give you a lot more money but I’m certainly not going to waste our patio space recycling milk cartons and yogurt containers and other plastics anymore.  I’m going to find out about steel cans too before I waste any more time with those.  I want to save the planet but at the same time if they don’t want to recycle certain things then it’s out of my hands.  I can only do so much by using the cloth grocery bags and recycling plastic and aluminum.