8 Things You Can't Recycle and What You Should Do Instead

With the world continuing to become more and more focused on excess and convenience it's more important than ever to reduce, reuse, and recycle as much as we can. There have been a lot of advancements in recycling and recycling centers are much more prevalent than they once were. Still, some items remain taboo in the recycling bins as the regular city recycling program is not equipped to handle everything. Here's some things to keep out of the recycling bin, and some ideas on where they can go instead.

Wax lined cartons and boxes -

Milk cartons and some frozen food containers fall into this category, and it seems like they should feel right at home tucked in your recycling bin, but the mixture of wax and paper makes things too confusing for standard recycling to be feasible. However they can be reused. How to reuse milk cartons is limited only by the Internet and your imagination. Several cities host milk carton boat races for special occasions, including the Minneapolis Aquatenial held every July. It'll take a lot of milk to make a boat. If you aren't quite that ambitious, you could simply cut off the top and bottom of the carton and use them as molds for sand castles, snow forts, or even candles.

Pizza Boxes

Look at all that cardboard. You mean you really can't recycle that? Some of it is understandable. Sometimes pizza can leave an awful mess in the box, but other times pizza boxes are practically clean, save a grease spot or two, and that never hurt anyone. I found some pretty imaginative suggestions on how to reuse pizza boxes, as drawer liners/dividers, pastry boxes for bringing cookies or cupcakes to work, or even making a solar oven to cook another pizza in!

Plastic Bags

Plastic bags from grocery and other retail stores seem to have a way of multiplying like bunny rabbits. It's nice to have a few around to use to clean the cat litter box, or take along when you walk the dog, or to put in your gym bag to house your wet towel or swimsuits.

Try keeping about a dozen bags in your car, or a few in your backpack to reuse when you go on a new shopping venture. There are also many stores that sell environmentally friendly cloth shopping bags. Getting a few of these can also cut down on plastic bag use.

Styrofoam (polystyrene)

With all those little white bead things forming into the shape that kept your new vacuum cleaner safe seems like it should be able to be melted down and reformed, but it truth it contains chemicals that could contaminate other recyclables or even landfills. If you can avoid using the stuff all together, more power to you, if not try to get as much use out of it as possible. Use if for craft projects, or break it up and have your own packing peanuts the next time you need to mail a gift.

Plastic Caps

Whether it's the top to your soda or water bottle or your shampoo top plastic caps need to break tides with their corresponding recyclable plastic bottle once the bottle hits the recycling bin. It's not impossible to recycle these, but a jack of all trades recycler like the one your city is most likely hosting isn't going to have the resources. As a solution, Aveda has a caps recycling program designed specifically for these caps.

Photographs

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but face it there are likely photos out there you'd rather silence. If you can't bear looking at some of your photos you can glue them face size together and turn them into coasters for guests. You can let the kids decorate them if you wish. If you like the pictures fine, but find you have an abundance you can make small scrapbooks or give them to younger relatives to help with school projects.

Hardcover books-- There's a company in Ohio called Grossman Environmental Recycling that will recycle hardcover books, but your average city recycling collector doesn't. If your books are in good shape, you can try selling them to a used bookstore or give them away to churches, daycares, nursing homes, or libraries. If none of those options work, you can try cutting the front and back covers off to make unique picture frames.

Wire Hangers --

Wire hangers are a bone of contention for a lot of people. You can actually buy them, but many of them migrate into your household via your dry cleaning. We've all heard the claims of being able to break into your own car with a wire hanger after leaving the keys in the ignition, and some use wire hangers for craft projects or even to hang their clothes, but if you can't put them to good use dry cleaners will often take them back to re-use.

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http://planetgreen.discovery.com/food-health/reuse-pizza-boxes.html

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recyle-or-reuse-wax-milk-cartons-good-question-121037

http://www.greenlivingtips.com/articles/218/1/Recycling-
styrofoam.html

http://www.aveda.com/aboutaveda/caps.tmpl?ngextredir=1#

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http://www.grossmanenvironmentalrecycling.com/services.aspx

http://www.aquatennial.org/history.php