Recycling 101

Fact: Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a TV for three hours. So, yes, it pays off. Here’s how to do it right wherever you live.

Collect newspapers in a paper grocery bag or in tied bundles, depending on your community’s guidelines, and set them out on pickup day. (It takes up to 75,000 trees to produce one Sunday edition of the New York Times.)
Don’t recycle wet cardboard. It can clog sorting machines. Throw it away to keep it from contaminating the rest of the load.
Don’t recycle bottle tops; they’re not made from the same plastic as recyclable bottles. But if you forget, don’t sweat it. They’ll be sorted down the line. (The energy saved by recycling one plastic bottle can power a computer for 25 minutes.)
Rinse cans, but crushing isn’t necessary. The aluminum can is the most recycled item in the United States, as well as the most valuable. It can be recycled again and again, and so efficiently that a can is regenerated and back on the shelf in as little as 60 days.
Don’t fret if you can’t get the lime out of the beer bottle or the last of the peanut butter from the jar. The recycler’s machinery will zap all contaminants. But do empty and rinse glass jars and containers.

Thinking GREEN

Your Carbon-Saving Equation
See how your earth-friendly measures make a difference: Simply add up the pounds of carbon dioxide (CO2) next to those actions on the chart. For a more tangible sense of what that number means, work out whether you have saved enough to offset the pollution that one car emits in a year by dividing your total by 12,037 (the pounds of CO2 that the average car emits annually).*

Action: Recycle Aluminum and Steel Cans
Why it’s worth it: Recycling aluminum and steel cans directs valuable metal into new products, saving 95 percent of the energy required to manufacture aluminum from scratch and 74 percent of the energy needed to make steel.
Your one-year effect: 414 pounds of CO2 saved.
The effect if everyone in the U.S. did it for one year: Equal to 3,934,118 cars taken off the road for one year.

Action: Recycle Newspapers and Magazines
Why it’s worth it: Americans throw away more paper than any other kind of trash. Recycling the pounds of magazines and newspapers the average household accrues in a year not only saves trees but also reduces contributions to air pollution by 95 percent.
Your one-year effect: 581 pounds of CO2 saved.
The effect if everyone in the U.S. did it for one year: Equal to 5,511,566 cars taken off the road for one year.

Green facts

Did you know?
$210: Money saved in one year of energy bills by switching to a new refrigerator and clothes washer.

$82: Money saved in one year by switching to eco-friendly cleaning products such as white vinegar, baking soda, lemon juice and olive oil.

$135: Money saved in one year by a family of four when they recycle one bottle or can per day.