Wednesday 4 February 2009

Do we need to wash the bottles when we recycle them?

I have always wondered about this questions and I have also always worried about that lime in the corona bottle so it was good to read this article in Slate.com. Now if could we could get our apartment association to agree to recycle, then we would not have to drive to our friends house to use his recycle bin every couple of weeks! Sounds hilarious but it is what we have to do!

We try to reduce our packaging, they just don't make it all that easy for you, for example I am always trying to use my re-usable bag, once I was in a big store, and the lady at the checkout tore a plastic carrier bag out and started packing my purchases into the plastic carrier bag, despite me having said twice I had my own bag. She finally got it, took the stuff out of the plastic carrier bag and went to put it in my re-usable bag. She then took the plastic carrier bag and tossed it in her bin. I was horrified and spent another two minutes explaining the concept to her, she then looked at me, a light flickered, and she said, "oh you recycle!" I wanted to hug her in gratitude, she had finally got it! It takes a while, but with a little patience they might just get it. That day the people behind me at the checkout loved me, but it was worth it, just to get through to one person. I appreciate it will take a lot more, but when even the easy stuff is so hard for so many, these minor achievements are worth the effort - for me anyway.

3 comments:

Dhara said...

OMG.

S and I constantly arghue about this - I am of the opinion that you do wash them out - this is because I know that the recycling scheme in local authority areas actually sort by hand - or at least they used to- therefore you cant throw sharp things, broken glass and dirty things into your home recycling. but S always uses the 'machines sort them they are advanced technology' argument. very interesting article.

and also about your checkout person - WHY!? do they always insist on giving bags? even when they can see you holding your own bag, ready!?

mind you, i think its slightly mad to be too evangelical about one element of the environment over the other, and recycling is good, but reducing consumption and re-using is even better isnt it.

Jigna said...

Oh yeah I agree, that's why I said we try to reduce our packaging in general. By the way Wooley is in the process of recycling all our old electronic stuff, we did that at home before we left too. Wooley had to go to the Volvo garage yesterday, our Volvo is poorly, and they had this signed photo of a guy, who has had his Volvo for 2 1/2 million miles, if you keep the car nice, a Volvo will last you forever, talk about re-using!

Jigna said...

If I start referring to "W" will it get confusing cos you know who has moved into the neighborhood?!