Direct from SptBlog editor Kathryn Usher's blog, crazy in shreveport - on blogspot:
The Dirt on Shreveport Recycling
Here's the visual for a great cartoon: A woman stands in front of three bins. They are marked PAPER, CANS and PLASTIC. She places her separated trash into these containers. What she doesn't see is that under the floor there are tubes that send everything into a trash truck headed for a landfill.
THIS ISN'T HAPPENING IN SHREVEPORT!
A post at Shreveport.blogspot.com on September 16 entitled "Garbage and the mayoral candidates" worried me enough to leave a comment. It was about the efforts to green up Shreveport.
After reading it I was concerned that my newly separated cans and plastic bottles were landfill bound. I blogged about it at my myspace site. Noma suggested contacting Liz Swaine. Here's what she had to say:
"Yes, there is always a market for aluminum. I also did some checking and found out that your plastics are being recycled, too, so you ARE making a difference! Here is the response I got from our superintendent of solid waste on the question: Plastic received at the Recycling Center is dispersed nation wide and processed to construct everything from polyester used to make carpet and other products containing polyester to new products made of plastic. Several of the companies we use are, Clean - Tech, a company in Dundee, Michigan and K. W. Plastics, in Troy, Alabama."
Didn't ask about newspapers because I don't recycle those, yet. I mostly reuse them in the litter boxes (yes we have two, sometimes three).
About the picture: These are cans waiting in my kitchen to get squished.
posted by Crazy In Shreveport @ 7:51 AM
2 Comments:
At 9:19 AM, Noma said…
What about the gobs of heavy paper I'm driving to Centenary's Recycling dumpster? Did she say? Do you know?
At 8:18 AM, Crazy In Shreveport said…
Well, um, I didn't ask about paper. Tag, you're it. You get to ask about that one. I'm afraid she'll think I'm stalking her.
5 comments:
Shreveport Green provides tours of the recycling center in Shreveport. I scheduled one last spring. It was very informative. You even get to walk through the plant and see the machines working.
I got to be around the professor that organized the recycling center at Centenary, and got to gist of the whole project (I was her research assitant, so I got the dish on most of her projects). I can almost guarantee that your recycling goods are going someplace to be handled. However, to make it get there, the aluminum can bin has to be full, otherwise there's zero profit for the recycling company (there's not much money in paper...). So drink those coca-colas till your teeth fall out.
It is wonderful to find that I am not the only one who is concerned about the state of the Green here in Shreveport. I have tried several times to be a good world citizen, to recycle glass, paper, plastic, cardboard. It seems I can never get it right and when I head to the dumpsters I can't seem to find one that takes plastic. Having to drive trash to be recycled is so freaking primative anyhow. Just another example of how far behind Shreveport is as compared to other cities of its size. And incidentally, just another reason on my long list of why I can't wait to move away from here.
I find it hard to believe that an area the size of S'port/Bossier doesn't have a recycling company that provides "bins" in certain locations. I would be interested to learn a little more about the business of recycling plastics, glass, and styrofoam, etc.
There is a company in Shreveport that takes plastics for recycyling. It is Allied Waste in the 6400 block of St. Vincent Ave.
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