The Shadow
Dear Recycle Lady,
Are there any plastics that are compostable?
Composter
Dear Composter,
The only plastic that might be compostable is #7 plastic, but it is not suitable for home composting. Number seven plastics require a modern, commercial composting facility for composting and there are very few of these facilities. As you know, the number in the triangular symbol tells the type of chemicals that makes up a particular plastic and #7 plastics are made up of all the chemicals that don’t fit in one of the other six categories. This makes composting difficult and recycling impossible.
Dear Recycle Lady,
What is a water footprint?
Necessary for Life
Dear Necessary for Life,
Your water footprint is based on your use of water inside and outside your home. Your direct water use footprint is the water from the tap that you use when you shower, brush your teeth, or wash your hands. It is also the water from the hose outside. The water calculator at www.watercalculator.org can be used to determine your water footprint. You may be surprised at how many gallons of water you and your household use in a day. It will also give you the average U.S. gallons of water used per day for the size of your household. However, a water footprint also includes water use that you don’t see that occurs in the production of goods that you buy. According to freetheocean.com, a water footprint is the total amount of water used to produce a product or support an activity. For example, it takes three times as much water to make a plastic bottle as the amount of water contained in the bottle; 713 gallons of water to grow the cotton needed to produce one everyday cotton T-shirt and approximately 37 gallons of water to grow and process the number of beans needed for a single cup of coffee. Individuals, businesses, and countries can all use the water footprint to understand how they can help the environment by using less water. There are several different descriptive terms used for water. Surface water and groundwater are called blue water, rainwater is called green water, and water used to generate the wastewater used in making manufacturing safe for reuse is grey water.
Dear Recycle Lady,
Help! This morning my mailbox was again full of catalogs that I do not want. I know they can be recycled, but is there a way to stop them from coming?
No More Magazines
Dear No More Magazines,
You are correct. Catalogs can be recycled, but reducing the number of catalogs printed is definitely the better choice for the environment. Fortunately, there is a way to opt out of receiving unwanted catalogs. Catalog Choice is a non-profit organization working to stop junk mail by discontinuing the delivery of unwanted magazines. The website is: https://www.catalogchoice.org. It may take a month or two, but you will no longer receive the listed catalogs. I have opted out of several catalogs using Catalog Choice. It is a very simple procedure. According to oceanfutures.org, over 100 million trees, 28 billion gallons of water, and enough energy to power more than 9 million cars is used every year to produce junk mail.
There is still a need for a non-profit organization to take over the Trex plastic film recycling project. Trex offers a large sustainable bench in exchange for 1,000 pounds of plastic film. While that sounds like a lot of pounds, with the strong support of this community, organizations have completed the collection in three to four months. Please contact Dear Recycle Lady for more specifics or text me at 304-667-1434.
Have questions about recycling, or interesting information about recycling? Send questions or requests to Recyclelady7@gmail.com. Dear Recycle Lady is sponsored jointly by the Greenbrier Recycling Center and Greenworks Recycling.
