Spending more time at home in the last few months since Covid-19 redefined our reality has presented many with an opportunity to clean, rearrange furniture and make lifestyle modifications.One thing we noticed at home was that some of the items that found their way into our recycle bin, or worse, the trash bin, really didn’t need to be there.
有良心的消费者，当然也包括那些登陆本页面的人，可能会意识到过度包装和浪费等问题，并希望为地球尽自己最大的努力。即使我们尽了最大的努力来减少家庭垃圾，我们也不一定总是知道最好的方法，也不一定总是知道什么材料是真正可回收的。所以我们要在这里清理一下!
回收材料在拾取路缘后会发生什么?
Recyclable materials that homeowners put out for pickup get sent to a sorting center, where in some cases there are machines that do some of the task, but oftentimes it is done by hand.So, as you pitch an item into your recycle bin, imagine that those containers, whether clean or not, will need to be handled by human hands.
For that reason, it really is a nice gesture to give items a rinse first to make that job a bit more bearable. And for more reasons that just kindness towards those doing a thankless task, cleanliness does matter. The few moments you have to spend getting rid of food residue will avoid contamination of the material. A recyclable pizza box, which is a large amount of reusable cardboard, should be free of food scraps. Otherwise, it defeats the reason for participating in this necessary activity.
一些家庭用品是可回收的，你花了时间回收，然后用另一辆卡车运输，如果它们没有得到适当的清洁，最终可能会被扔进垃圾桶。当这种情况发生时，你回收某样东西的意图可能对环境造成了更有害的影响，如果你把它扔进了垃圾桶。
How to properly sort your own recyclable materials
现在您已经冲洗了容器(我们希望如此)，还有其他事情需要考虑。首先，不要把盖子盖在容器上。If you throw a glass jar in the bin with a lid on it, it is possible that someone will have to manually take that lid off. If the lid of a can has been totally removed, bend it in half so it’s easier to handle at the sorting center. And if its a lid on a broken bottle, it will likely get thrown to the trash for the safety of the handler.
Make an effort to ensure that anything you put in your recycle bin actually is recyclable, because not all items are. Not all metal, glass and plastics are recyclable. Look for the recycling symbol somewhere on the packaging to indicate if it is. Plastic and metal kitchenware items aren’t generally recyclable, nor are broken drinking glasses, to name just a few items.
你怎么知道哪些材料是可回收的?
To know for certain what household packaging materials are recyclable in your region you would need to check with your city or municipalityas that will vary depending upon their capacity to process and find markets for reuse. To err on the side of caution will not usually have the desired effect for a number of reasons. For one, it can in a way act to give us a subconscious free-pass to purchase products with packaging that will only end up in landfills.
Some metals, plastics, and paper products are recyclable, but not all. And, any product that has an almost inseparable combination of those materials will require energy-intensive mechanical separation, but the more likely scenario is that they will end up in a landfill. Example – you know those little drink boxes you see in most kids’ lunches? They are a mix of plastic, paper and foil all sandwiched together. If people realized that, it is likely a few more would be sending kids to school with reusable containers instead.
Why is it important to sort your recyclables?
Firstly, don’t just sort your recyclable containers, try to condense and stack them as much as possible.原因是回收车和垃圾车有不同的协议。垃圾车可以尽可能地压缩载重，而回收车一般不会。当回收卡车操作员开始听到玻璃破碎的砰砰声时，是时候清空卡车了，因为他们的货物通常会由人处理，而不是像现在这样被丢弃。
So, if we load up our recycle bins with things that are actually garbage, that means trucks have to get emptied prematurely, and the sorting that ‘we’ don’t do will need to be done by employees paid with your tax dollars.
For any that would like to go that extra mile, here are a lot of easy ways to help:
- Pull apart any items with both plastic and paper or metal components
- Crush pop cans
- Compress large pop bottles
- Take both ends off of tin cans and flatten them
- Stack things like yogurt containers whenever possible
These small acts can easily cut the volume of your recyle bin by half or more, making life easier on waste workers, cutting trips for trucks, and increasing the amount of materials that actually get recycled.
How to dispose of phones and batteries safely
Important note – batteries and cell phones should never be put in recycling bins. Of all the items that are mistakenly disposed of as recycling, some of the more dangerous items are Lithium Ion batteries.
There is aflammable electrolyte in Lithium Ion batteriesthat can, under certain circumstances, be at risk of combusting. The hopper of garbage and recycling trucks can be hot, and also under pressure as waste and recyclables are compacted. This combination has on occasion had disastrous results causing trucks to catch fire.
The other risk of combustion is once they reach sorting facilities and often go through mechanical sorting and compressing equipment. So please remember to always treat computers, phones and batteries as dangerous toxic waste and only dispose of them through the proper channels.
Now you know more aboutsorting home recycling correctly, learn more aboutreducing waste,composting,disposing of construction wasteand othereasy lifestyle changes to reduce your environmental footprintin these pages :
Find more about green home constructionin the EcohomeGreen Building Guide pages- also, learn more aboutthe benefits of a free Ecohome Network Membership here. |
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