Top 10 Recycling Tips for Work

Looking to kickstart good recycling habits that you can share with your friends, family and co-workers? Here’s a list of the top 10 ways you and the people you spend the most time with can start recycling right away without breaking the bank or your backs.

1. Reuse your morning coffee cup. Or better yet, buy a mug to avoid the waste caused by throwing away the paper or Styrofoam
2. Make recycling bins readily accessible. Make paper, plastic and metal recycling bins readily available in your home and office and ensure they’re placed out in the open. Label each bin appropriately so the contents don’t get mixed up and can easily be sorted for recycling. You’ll be surprised how natural recycling becomes in your home or office when it’s made more convenient.
3. Favor products with a recycled option. Other than paper, plastic and metal, the amount of materials that are capable of being recycled is steadily increasing. When shopping around for your next purchase look out for the recycled option on the packaging. Familiarising yourself with the full details of any product you’re purchasing can be a useful habit to get into.
4. Recycle your old technology. Americans throw out north of two million tons of electronic waste (e-waste) each year. Don’t take our word for it, this statistic was publicized by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). You can prevent your waste being added to this shocking statistic by recycling your outdated technology. To learn more about electronic recycling, visit http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/hazwaste/recycle/ecycling/donate.htm.
5. Embrace recycled paper and dual-sided printing. Whether you’re using the printer at home or in the office, make sure you use recycled paper and print on both sides of each sheet of paper you use. You can find dual-sided printers and recycled paper at most home/office stores. When you’re finished with the paper, recycle it. Recycling your paper can have a significant impact on the amount of trees, water, and landfill space being saved. For example, 7,000 gallons of water, three cubic yards of landfill space and 17 trees can be saved from one ton of paper.
6. Recycle your empty ink and toner cartridges. About eight ink and toner cartridges are discarded per second in the United States. If you do the math, that’s close to 700,000 cartridges being thrown out a day.
7. Purchase remanufactured ink and toner cartridges. Following on from the previous point, you can help our cartridge friends find a better home by buying them in their remanufactured state. Remanufactured ink and toner cartridges work just as good and have no loss in quality or efficacy. What’s more, for each cartridge that gets remanufactured roughly 2.5 pounds of plastic and metal are kept out of landfills, and about half a gallon of oil is saved.
8. Use rechargeable batteries. When you buy batteries, buy rechargeable ones. One rechargeable battery has the lifespan of 1,000 regular batteries. Now, that’s power! Once you’re done with your batteries, recycle them.
9. Store your files in the cloud instead of CDs or DVDs. Rather than using CDs or DVDs for your projects, use cloud storage services to manage and access your files on all your devices. Not only are cloud storage services a much more efficient way to manage your files, but they will also save you precious office space without throwing anything away.
10. Recycle any old newspapers in your office. If you want to clear out the newspapers laying around your office either give it to someone else to read or recycle it.