Plastic

Plastic bottle neck numbered 1—7 can be recycled at the centers. Don’t recycle your #7 corn-based biodegradable plastic bottles

Plastic bags in good condition are accepted and reused. Keep them separate from your other recyclables.

Facts On Plastic

• Bottled water costs between $1 and $4 per gallon, and 90 percent of the cost is in the bottle, lid and label.
• The average American consumed 1.6 gallons of bottled water in 1976. In 2006 that number jumped to 28.3 gallons.
• The Plastic bottles our water comes in is made out of OIL. This is the same oil that is used to make gasoline.
• It takes over 1.5 million barrels of oil to manufacture a year’s supply of bottled water. That’s enough oil to fuel 100,000 cars.

Why is it Important to Recycle Plastic?

Plastics are recycled for both economic and environmental reasons. Recycling and reuse of plastics have the obvious benefit of decreasing the amount of used plastics that end up in landfills. Unfortunately, 8 out of 10 plastic water bottles end up in landfills. Reducing our need of throw away plastic containers and packaging could be a significant step toward waste reduction and protecting our environment.

More information can be found at American Chemistry Council, Earth911.com, and the US Environmental Protection Agency