Americans increasingly are catching recycling fever

Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Dec 12, 2006 by PAM ZUBECK THE GAZETTE

Recycling newspapers is part of Wayne Stern's routine.

When his green plastic tub is full, it's time to dump the contents into a recycling bin.

On a recent day, he unloaded his tub into a bin in the parking lot of Wal-Mart on Platte Avenue.

"The Shriners have these places all over town," Stern said, referring to Al Kaly Shriners Recycle program, which uses the proceeds to fund charities.

A building contractor, Stern grew up on a farm in Minnesota, where recycling is part of the routine of making the most of every commodity, including manure.

"Everything goes round and round," he said. "It's good for the environment."

Stern is among thousands of Colorado Springs residents who recycle everything from plastic to junk mail.

It's unclear whether more people are recycling larger amounts of waste locally, but recycling is at an all-time high nationally.

The Environmental Protection Agency reported in October that people recycled 32 percent of their trash in 2005.

Including composting, Americans recycled 79 million tons, a 2 percent increase from 2004 and a huge jump from 16 percent in 1990.

Americans generated nearly 246 million tons of municipal solid waste in 2005 -- a decrease of nearly 2 million tons from 2004.

The decrease is due in part to the decline in individual waste generation to about 4.5 pounds per person per day, representing a 1.5 percent decrease from 2004.

In addition to generating less waste, individuals recycled nearly 1.5 pounds per person per day.

The EPA also reported that recycling trends are generally up, including the recycling of 42 million tons of paper -- a 50 percent recycling rate.

At Waste Management Recycle America, 602 E. 4th St., major account manager Garry Foster said, "It's getting better all the time."

One reason, he said, is Colorado Springs draws population from both coasts and the upper Midwest, where recycling is the law.

"So many of them come from areas that have mandatory recycling," he said.

"People do it, and it becomes second nature."

For example, Foster said he gets calls from office buildings that didn't recycle paper until newcomers from California arrived and asked, "Why aren't we recycling?"

Waste Management Recycle America pays for some recyclables, such as aluminum, and promotes paper recycling with schools and churches by offering $5 per ton.

"Our paper program is growing by leaps and bounds," he said, noting that his company has a paper bin at roughly 120 schools in Colorado Springs and Pueblo.

"One of the reasons I like to do elementary schools is, they're not very big, and they don't have a lot of kids like a high school might, but I'm able to catch these kids at a young age and get them to recycle," he said.

"My goal is to make it easy to recycle. If it's easy, people will do it. If it's not, they'll throw it away," he said.

Recycle America accepts glass food and beverage containers, 1 and 2 plastic bottles (numbers are embossed near the bottom), steel cans, aluminum beverage cans, polyurethane carpet pads, newspaper, junk mail, office paper, magazines, phone books, cardboard and chip board.

"We have our 'Let It Rip' program," he said.

"If you can rip it, you can put it in our container.

"That means magazines, catalogues, newspapers, junk mail, as long as it doesn't have identity numbers on it, like a credit card application."

For more about the Shriners' recycling program: http:// alkalyshrine.org/shrine_recycle_program.htm

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0238 or pam.zubeck@gazette.com