Welcome guest poster, Paul Leonard.
Two years ago I moved to New Jersey from London, England to work at Rutgers university as a research biochemist. Although unrelated to my job, I am passionate about the need to conserve the earth’s resources and to reduce the amount of trash we all throw away. I started out trying to reduce the environmental impact of my own home but I came across a problem that is common throughout New Jersey.
In New Jersey each town is responsible for its own recycling collection. Some towns choose to use the county recycling scheme whereas others use alternative businesses to collect their waste. It seemed to me that there was very little coordination in New Jersey between the town, county and other commercial recycling schemes.
When I look at my local town website, for instance, there was a list of items that they said I could put in the curbside recycling box but no mention of what I could do with the items that they did not accept. Having delved a little deeper online, I discovered that a lot of recyclable items can be taken to local stores for collection, if they are not accepted in the curbside recycling box. It also struck me that the opening hours of my local recycling center are not always convenient for anyone with a nine to five job but many of the local stores that collect recyclables were open late in the evening or throughout the weekend. In addition I can combine the dropping off of recyclable materials with my shopping at the supermarket or mall so it is considerable more convenient for my to recycle in this way.
I realized that if my town and county recycling websites only promote their own recycling options then a lot of waste will needlessly be thrown in the trash which could have been recycled. Surely there are a lot of New Jersey residents out there who wish to recycle more but simply do not know where to look for the information they need.
I decided I would do something to make it easier to find out what can be recycled in New Jersey and if the item is not collected from outside your home, provide all of the options on where you can take the item for collection instead. The website I created is http://www.recyclingnj.com. It contains a page with ideas for reducing the amount of waste in the first place (http://www.recyclingnj.com/reduce.html), links to NJ town and county recycling webpages (http://www.recyclingnj.com/curbside.html) and the page I am most excited about is my recycling page (http://www.recyclingnj.com/recycle.html) with pictures of all the items that can be recycled in New Jersey.
I hope that people who use my website will be shocked about just how much can be recycled. I certainly never knew that you could recycle old bank cards, make-up containers or paint. I’ve tried to make a recycling website intuitive to navigate and as concise as possible. If you want to know how to recycle bottle caps simply go to the “What can I recycle?” page and click on the bottle caps link. All the options for bottle cap recycling (both metal and plastic) will be on that one webpage. Alternatively, if you want information on how to recycle old CDs or DVDs – click on the CD/DVD picture and you’ll very quickly discover options for reuse or recycling. I hope that my site will help to reduce the amount of waste that ends up in the trash in New Jersey. I guess the New Jersey landfills will be the ultimate judge.
Editor Note: This is one of the best recycling website I have found. Even if you don’t live in New Jersey, I urge everyone to take a look. Some of Paul’s source of recycling are not in New Jersey (such as the bank cards.)
If you know a great state or county recycling website that you reccommend, please list the site in the comments below. Heck, if you author a recycling blog or website, list it below with a little info about it. Mother Earth needs a break from all our trash.
Also, check out Earth 911 for more recycling information in your area.
Peter Insalaco says
Hello Green World…I believe the work that Paul Leonard has done is what we (The Planet) need more of. Eco-Action, less talk more action. I discovered Clean The World on a internet website several months ago. After viewing the videos & contacting them I decided to do what I could do to help bring the program to metro New York. The program i collecting used soap & bottled amenities from hotel Sanitizing the and distributing the soap to help stem childhood mortality globally. Please check-out the site & find a way to pitch in or contact me. Thank You, Peter
Sabrina Ahmed says
I think the recycling website is a great idea. I think that the main reason that people don’t commit to being ‘Green’ is because sometimes it’s just not convenient. Giving people a website that tells you where to take what you’ve got eliminates the footwork behind recycling non-typical materials. Maybe one day this effort will spill over to other cities… wouldn’t it be superb if one day you could log into this type of website and request a recyclable material pickup… for things that aren’t accepted in the roadside bins? That may be me just dreaming but I think it’s a great idea.
I think that people like Paul certainly have the right idea. The reason that the Green community continues to thrive is because of the open exchange of resources and information; like this site. I always feel that if I find a resource that I feel will help others that I should share it and hope the benefit goes further than my home. Having said that; for those of you who are always looking to educate yourself on what’s going on in the environment and looking to further your efforts to live off the power grid, http://www.greeneutopia.com has an abundance of info on current green issues and trends. They also have a nifty little store that only sells Green products. It’s worth checking out.
Good Luck and Go Green
-Sabrina
Brian@Digital Printing Services Chicago says
I think it is good to make recycling options more accessible to their residents. Most people in small communities may not know about recycling options that are in fact available to them.
Nathan@ATV Parts says
That is good to see people promoting recycling on the internet. I think it is good for people to have access to this and know about the opportunities available to them in their community.
Paul Leonard says
Thank-you to all of the people who have left such kind comments about the website I have made. I hope you will pass on the website address to your friends, work colleagues, the strange guy that set next to you at the bar while you watched the game….
Thanks to all the folks who tweeted too. It’s fantastic you are helping spread the word and you may not know this but every tweet helps boost a websites google/bing/yahoo search ranking so you are helping spread the word in more ways than you might think.
One more thing. I just set up a facebook page called recyclingnj.com so please post any recycling ideas you have on our wall and I would love to hear from people who have found my website useful to them. I spent so many months of long evenings getting the website built so it would really mean a lot to me to know that my efforts are helping to make a difference.
Best wishes to you all.
Paul
ATV Covers says
I still can’t believe it that now people have selected internet website for the recycling of scraps and wastages. I think its good and great idea of promoting recycling through by internet. I think each and everyone should support it. I really liked the way you are promoting and your post as well. Thanks for sharing such a informative article. Good Job.
Paul says
I was looking for ideas on how to reduce the amount of waste I generate in my home and at work and I came across the New York City wasteless website. I seems to be really well laid out with very simple ideas on how to reduce the amount of trash we all generate. I thoroughly recommend it to everyone, not just NY city residents.
Rich @ Web Design Leeds says
Nice website.
I think it would perhaps benefit from being a phone app too, to make it quick and easy to check an item’s recyclability when you are sorting your rubbish.
Anna@Green Talk says
Rich, can you make it a phone app for him? If so, you should contact the website. It would definitely give the website more exposure. Anna
Paul says
Dear Rich,
Thanks for the kind comment about my website. You are quite right that a phone app would be useful.
At the moment I have no plan to develop a smart phone app for my website mainly because I don’t have a clue where to start (I have literally no IT training and built the website by following you tube videos and a lot of learning from my mistakes).
If there is an IT professional out there who would be interested in taking on this project I would be very happy to talk to them about it, although it would have to be on a volunteer basis as I cannot afford to pay anyone to do it.
I can be contacted via the contact form on my website
http://www.recyclingnj.com/contact.html