One way in which humans affect the environment is through the generation of garbage. According to the Annenberg Foundation, the average American throws away 4.6 lbs. of trash every single day, and that adds up to a substantial waste stream that must go somewhere, and landfills are quickly becoming overwhelmed. One way to stem this flow of trash is through the "reduce, reuse, and recycle" movement.
Ethane and propane are heated and combined with a catalyst to create a powdered polymer. The polymer is then melted and formed into pellets. Plastic manufacturers use these pellets to form their final products, including water ...
A 2009 Harris Interactive survey found that over two-thirds of respondents recycled. Recycling glass and plastic bottles offers you an opportunity to reduce your carbon footprint and benefit the environment. Recycling bottles a...
Many communities are offering recycling programs with curbside pickups or dropoff centers. Do a quick read through recycling guidelines, and you'll almost always see the instructions, "Rinse cans, bottles and food containers." ...
Many items likely go into your trash bin that can be recycled. Municipalities offer different recycling options. You can also use a retailer or buy-back center to recycle certain materials. A little organization regarding your ...
Reduce your negative impact on the environment by finding new ways to recycle and reuse your old plastic bottles; it may be easier and more fun than you think.
Recycling is good for the environment, and it can also be good for your wallet. You can make extra money by turning in recyclable cans, bottles and plastic, instead of putting them in the trash. If you live in a pay-to-throw ar...
A plastic bottle brush can be a lifesaver for anyone who needs to scrub the inside of a container with a narrow opening. Whether you need to clean a baby bottle or a decorative vase, the flexible bristles of a bottle brush can ...
Recycling empty containers reduces waste and helps the environment. Many communities have recycling program in which residents can place empty bottles and cans next to their trash bins for their local recycling station to pick ...
Daily, this translates to 4 pounds of trash per person. Much of the trash Americans discard is recyclable. However, our rate of recycling averages only 25 percent. By recycling your trash, you can preserve the planet and enrich...
Recycling provides you with one way to reduce your environmental impact. Commonly recycled products include plastics and bottles. If you are fortunate enough to live in a community with curbside recycling pick-up, all you need ...
Compounding the obvious impact of plastic bottles on the overall volume of consumer waste, the chemicals used to manufacture plastic resins can also be harmful to human health as well as the environment. A 2009 study led by Kat...
Most people use plastic every day in the form of packaging for products like frozen foods, yogurt and soft drinks. Plastic bottles are commonplace, and they will clearly remain in use in the near future. There are several posit...
The American Chemistry Council estimates that the average consumer uses 166 plastic water bottles each year and that 2.5 million plastic bottles are thrown away every hour. While plastic water bottles offer convenience, they al...
What goes into the recycling bin depends on where you live and what kinds of recyclable materials your municipal area picks up. Generally, recyclable materials fall into four categories: paper, plastic, glass and metal. Some pl...
Most states pay refunds to those who recycle glass and plastic bottles and aluminum cans at recycling centers, depending on the rebate value printed on the side of containers. Even if the containers can't be redeemed for cash, ...
Small amounts of chemicals have been found in drinking water kept in hard plastic drinking bottles. A chemical used in the manufacture of polyethylene terephthalate bottles, called antimony, is being cited by Heidelberg Univers...
Users throw away billions of them each year, putting pressure on already stressed landfill resources. However, companies can turn recycled plastic bottles into new products and materials. If you recycle your plastic water bottl...
Reusable water bottles have gained popularity with the bisphenol A and phthlates that are known to leach from the clear plastic bottles used for drinking water. Resusable water bottle save the earth by reducing waste in landfi...
Plastic bottles are everywhere you turn. Drinking water, soda, various food products and even condiments come in plastic bottles. While plastic bottles provide manufacturers with a cheap and convenient way to package their prod...
You may need to contact them or visit their website to find out which numbers they’ll accept. To figure out what you have, turn your plastic bottles upside down—the number on the bottom enclosed in triangular arrows...
Recycling plastic bottles is one easy and small step you can take to help protect the environment. The American Chemistry Council notes that in 2008 people in the United States recycled a total of 2.4 billion pounds of plastic....
Plastic is commonly used for beverage bottles, including baby bottles. However, recent studies show that bisphenol A, or BPA, a chemical found in plastics that has similar effects as estrogen, may be harmful to your health and ...
The environmental impact is worsening due to the increased usage of water bottles, from 3.3 billion sold in 1997 to 15 billion in 2002, according to MSNBC. Relying on tap water and recycling the plastic bottles you do use are s...
The presence of bottled water in every bodega, supermarket and vending machine makes it highly accessible. The easy transportability of water in lightweight plastic bottles makes water available everywhere and at any time. In ...
With curbside recycling being offered in more and more communities each year, at home recycling is commonplace in 2010. Many everyday items found around the home can be recycled, keeping our landfills from becoming over-crowded...
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates 12 percent of U.S. solid waste is composed of plastic products. The good news is that as of 2008, 37 percent of PET soft drink bottles were recovered for recycling. PET, or po...
Nearly 90 percent of plastic bottles go unrecycled and end up in landfills or litter our cities, highways and ocean. Even if you're an assiduous recycler and manage to keep every plastic bottle you use out of the waste stream, ...
Before you purchase plastic utensils or stock up on plastic water bottles, you should consider the dangerous effects it can have on the environment. Furthermore, there are medical concerns associated with the consumption of wat...
Plastic can be a mysterious material to consumers. It serves so many purposes, yet very few really understand what's in it. As labeled for recycling purposes, seven different types of plastic make up common containers. In recen...
Some plastic bottles can leach harmful chemicals into the fluids you drink from them. These chemicals include bisphenol A and phthalates. Bisphenol A interferes with the reproductive development of animals and has been indicate...
Plastic bottles are all around us, carrying spring water to soda, and everyone from athletes to babies drinks from them to get their nutrition. However, some plastic bottles are made from harmful chemicals that can leach into t...
Manufacturers use different types of plastic bottles to distribute beverages such as water, soda and beer. Despite the wide availability of recycling programs for these bottles, only 24 percent of plastic bottles were recycled ...
Americans throw away 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour, the Clean Air Council estimates. A key part of the green movement centers on the importance of recycling and its benefits to the environment. While most people are aw...
The most beneficial aspect of recycling is that it saves an innumerable amount of environmental resources. According to the Container Recycling Institute, more than 40 billion aluminum cans alone were recycled in 2006. In suffi...
Using plastic bottles poses several potential hazards. The primary danger stems from a chemical called Bisphenol A or BPA, which the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or FDA acknowledges as possibly dangerous. The Sierra Club e...
Most consumers refer to an item's recycling number, but the program's official name is the resin identification coding system. This system is the key to making sure common types of plastic are recycled correctly. Plastic bottle...
Litter is solid waste that someone did not place in a proper disposal container. Sometimes waste placed in the proper container becomes litter because the container tips over; it's blown by the wind or carried by water. To redu...
Drink bottles, ink cartridges, food containers, grocery bags and those seemingly impenetrable product packages are just a few of the plastics we encounter in the course of a day. Recyclable plastic items are marked with a numbe...
While Americans use millions of these bottles every year, only about 27 percent are recycled, according to the American Chemistry Council. To ensure the bottles you place in your recycling bin actually get recycled, it's import...
Once the beverage inside the bottle is gone, sending the bottles to the melting vat is not the only way to reuse the glass. You can also recycle beer bottles in practical and artistic ways to show off the colorful glass in an u...
Plastic has a base of oil or natural gas and does not biodegrade in a landfill. You can find plastic waste at the beach, on the ground in the forest and floating in the ocean. As of 2010, at least 14 countries have banned, or a...
Plastic containers are composed of chemicals that can leak out of the bottles and into the fluid. This occurs not only with water bottles, but also soda bottles, sports drink bottles and the most worrisome, baby bottles. How...
Recycling plastic bottles makes environmental sense. According to the Container Recycling Institute, hundreds of millions of plastic bottles become litter each year, costing millions of dollars for disposal efforts. Reinventing...
Plastic bottles pose an enormous threat to the environment. According to the Container Recycling Institute, an average of 877 plastic single-serving bottles are wasted every second, ending up as litter or in landfills. Given th...
Plastic bottle recycling is feasible in approximately 80 percent of United States households, as of 2010. Your municipal waste company may collect the bottles through a curbside recycling program. In other communities, you're r...
An ingredient in many hard plastic bottles manufactured since the 1960s is the chemical bisphenol A, also known as BPA. BPA may be present in items such as baby bottles and reusable water bottles. A 2008 study raised concerns a...
Laundry detergent, cough syrup, and sports drink bottles can be recycled into a number of products ranging from fleece jackets to lawn furniture. Besides conserving landfill space, recycling plastic bottles can impact the envir...
The issue of reusing plastic bottles, primarily those containing water, has been debated over the last several years. Reusing a plastic bottle may pose certain dangers to the consumer, but many of these risks are easily remedie...
Not all plastic bottles are created equal--the worst offenders are polycarbonate, PVC and styrene. Avoid these plastics by inspecting any bottles you buy for their recycling symbol, a triangle with a number inside. Polycarbonat...
These bottles make up the majority of the plastic waste stream according to the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA, and millions of bottles are sent to landfills each year. Despite the many economic and environmental benef...
A key part of green living involves the recycling of various materials, including plastics and plastic bottles that comprise a large part of plastics recycling. The next time you're tempted to toss your empty water bottle into ...
In this age of saving both money and the planet, reusing plastic bottles is a way to combine both. But online rumors have circulated that this is not safe practice and could be potentially harmful to your health. These rumors h...
A lot of confusion regards what items can and cannot be recycled, and it doesn't help that the rules vary depending on where you live. But don't get frustrated and simply throw away your soda bottle or peanut butter jar without...
Plastic is not biodegradable, but it is recyclable. If you're not sure how to recycle your plastic bottles, you're not alone. According to CNN, 80 percent of American households had access to plastic recycling programs in 2008,...
Recycling in the home is easier than ever, and many municipalities offer curbside pick up. By sorting out your glass, plastic, metal, and paper, you can dramatically reduce the amount of trash your family produces.
Any time you can help recycle plastic, including by reusing it, you are contributing to a cleaner environment. Consider substituting simple store-bought items with ones you make from plastic bottles and cups. You'll not only go...
According to a 2008 report by the United States Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. recycling rate is about 33 percent. While this shows some improvement over previous years, there are many steps we can take to increase r...
But our garbage is piling up. The EPA reports that since 1960, American trash production has almost tripled. With some effort, it is possible to create greener habits and become part of the solution to our waste buildup. Rec...
All plastic bottles can be identified with a Resin Identification Code---number one through seven---printed inside of the triangular recycling symbol. This code is typically printed on the bottom of the bottle, and identifies w...
Plastic bottles that are thrown out as trash are filling up landfills in alarming degrees. According to Patricia Franklin, who operates the Container Recycling Institute, it is imperative to recycle plastic bottles in order to ...
The energy used to manufacture these bottles makes up 4 percent of the total yearly energy expenditure. Reusing those plastic bottles serves a double purpose: it saves energy and reduces waste. You can take it upon yourself to ...
Plastic bottles are among the easiest plastics to recycle, and recycling enables you to have a direct impact on landfill size, energy use and whether the plastic bottles become trash or are given another life as a new product s...
Instead of throwing an empty water bottle away in the trash can, consider putting it in a recycling bin. Recycling plastic bottles not only conserves landfill space and energy to produce new bottles, but it also creates new pro...
According to the Earth 911 website, Americans buy an estimated 29.8 plastic water bottles each year. Nearly eight out of 10 of these bottles end up in landfills. By recycling a single plastic bottle, it saves enough energy to l...
Plastic is endlessly useful--so much so that it's a huge waste of potential, resources and energy for it to languish in a landfill. Without processing, you can turn plastic bottles into craft projects and useful home accessorie...
Plastic is found in several items we use or come into contact with on a day-to-day basis. While plastic saves us time and in some cases money, the effects of using it is damaging to the surface of the earth. Not only is plastic...
These days, we're encouraged to recycle, both at home, in the office and in the outdoors. Recycling all types of materials, from paper to plastic to Styrofoam, helps reduce the amount of trash going into landfills across the co...
Manufacturers code their products for recycling purposes, and some sources will tell you this code means something as to whether chemicals will leach out of the plastic or not. Codes touted as "safer" for recycling are 1, 2 an...
