...or trash burn'n day.
It's been three & a half months since our local trash company went out of business. There was another trash service that hauls the trash out of the county to another dump site, but their price was twice what we were paying and we were limited to how many bags we could dispose of.
So I decided to finally implement a mandatory recycling plan here at Krazo Acres. And things have been going pretty well. I've been to the recycling center twice now, both times with my 55-gallon bag of plastics. I can't believe how much plastic is thrown away! And there were still other plastic items that had to be separated that didn't go to the recycling center, namely plastic bags. But the local Wal-Mart has a bin at the front of the store for plastic bags so I've been saving bags and will take them there next time I go by (hope they don't notice the non-Walmart bags in there!!). Then there's still the plastic wrapping from items. Like every stinking item you purchase. It's amazing. So those little scraps of plastic get thrown into our household trash, to be burned at a later date.
Well, that later date turned out to be last night. I finally picked up a metal burn barrel about a month ago and Paul "ventilated" it for me this weekend so we hauled our burnable trash out to the back-40 for some good ol' hillbilly barbecuing! (Don't worry, I'm joking about the actual BBQ)
Since there was quite a bit of plastic bits & pieces in the trash, it wasn't like it was something you'd want to get all close and snuggly by while roasting marshmallows. At one time I was totally against burning anything plastic, but then decided that it can't be any worse than having it buried for centuries in a local landfill, eventually leaching nasties into our ground and drinking water. That's exactly why our previous waste company went out of business; land surrounding the actual landfill was being tested positive for contaminants leaching out of the supposedly sealed fill site. Nice, hugh?
As for the plastics? Damned if you do, damned if you don't. But I figured at least I'm a little bit ahead as we're now recycling everything we possibly can. Anything edible goes to the the cats/dogs/chickens/goats, anything organic but not edible goes into the compost heap, paper/cardboard gets burned or composted, plastic/glass/metal goes to the recycling center in town.
Are YOU recycling? If not, why not? :)
When we were in California a few years ago,they have recycling plants you can take your recycled stuff to and they paid you to bring it in.I think if we had more places like that more people would recycle ,what u think?
ReplyDeleteI'd be THRILLED if they had places that paid you for your recyclables around here. There's a place about an hour and a half away that does, but it's not worth it because of the gas costs. We do save our aluminum and Paul has a "scrap" heap down in the woods somewhere and we'll take that in to the "pay" recycling place once we get enough. But honestly, I'm just glad we finally have a place that will take the recyclables.
DeleteI'm impressed.
ReplyDeleteWe recycle, with the help of our garbage company who collect it along with garbage on collection days. In principle, I am all for "reduce, reuse, recycle", but to do it well does require a major effort and even then you're left with all the bits of plastic, like you said. My attitude towards the plastic is to at least try to prefentially buy items with less packaging to start with. I do think our society is way behind the times in enabling the mountains of packaging waste that we do.
I also think recycling(the stuff we put in the recycling bin) should be a paid deal. Id be rich.... because Im the one who would be scouring the roadsides and parks for stuff to take in. We also have a scrap pile (in the garage!) for bigger and multiple pieces and of course aluminum cans..even my neighbor saves me his. Also I dont think Walmart cares where the bags came from.... I wonder if they get paid for recycling those?
ReplyDeleteLisa
I'm about to ditch my trash hauler - while they do the one-stream recycling of just about everything, they are high-priced and unreliable. And have horrendous hold-music. So, it's back to the transfer station for me. This will force me to not bring anything I can't recycle into the house. Which will greatly limit my purchases. Which will save me money. See where I'm going with this? Love the Pop-Tart Kitties...
ReplyDeleteNo recycling comments but your new Nyan cat background is cute! My son loves him but, I only like him with the sound off.
ReplyDeletePlastics are my biggest annoyance. "They" try to keep us in an uproar over our gas guzzling vehicles, but nobody ever ways anything about disposable, petroleum based plastics. My ultimate plan is to stop buying so I don't have to worry about what to do with them!
ReplyDeleteYour system for dealing with things you can't recycle sounds a lot like ours.
ReplyDeleteFor a sparsely populated area out here in the boonies, we have a fantastic recycling facility . . . for which we are very, very grateful. They don't pay us for the stuff we bring in but, on the other hand, we don't have to pay to get rid of it. (Well, okay, I suppose we DO pay through our tax dollars but still . . . )
I LOVE to buy in bulk and do so as much as I can which does reduce packaging. But there are still some things we need that we don't have much control over. I'm thinking of a tool hubby bought recently (through the mail) which came so over packaged in cardboard AND molded plastic that it took him 1/2 an hour to get it opened. Grrrrr!
Check out this blogspot.
ReplyDeletehttp://recycled-craft.blogspot.com/
We've never had garbage service out where we live. Every few weeks it's a trip to the county landfill with a load of trash, so we do what we can to keep it to a minimum. We do what you do -- recycle what we can, feed critters with what's edible, and feed the compost the other organic waste. We also have a pile of canvas totes in the backs of our vehicles so we can pack our stuff home in our own bags (some grocery stores actually give a small discount if you bring your own bags). It's made a difference.
ReplyDeleteWe do the same. My husband welded up an incinerator because the burn barrels always rusted out. The only thing I can't figure out what to do with are metal lids. The recycler won't take them and I can't burn them.
ReplyDeleteHere is the burn barrel incinerator link if you want to see it, it works great and nothing can fly out and start a fire plus the critters can't get into it. http://movingontothepast.blogspot.com/2012/11/let-sparks-fly-making-burn-barrel.html
The only thing we recycle is aluminum cans, they go in the new fire truck fund bin for our local Rural Fire District. We actually only end up with maybe two kitchen-trash-can-size bags of trash a week and I feel pretty good about that. One of my friends has a burn barrel and I have actually been thinking about it. Now, if I can just convince hubby...
ReplyDeleteWe have a full size recycle can provided by the city that we have to pay for whether we use it or not, grrrr! I would prefer to haul it myself rather than pay the two separate companies that contract for the city, but the one nice thing is that we don't have to sort, everything recyclable goes in and the city sorts it (but that's what makes it expensive too!)
ReplyDelete