What to do with plastic bags and fire extinguishers

July 28, 2006

Dear Marti,
Now that Albertsons is closing, that leaves me with a big pile of plastic bags to recycle. Do you know where I can take them?
Signed,
Meredith

Dear Meredith,
This is the question du jour. Clearly Albertsons has been providing a great service to dedicated local recyclers that will be missed. Never fear, plastic bag recycling is still here. While we can't offer you deals on canned soup or coupons on family fun packs of cereal, Eco-Cycle can offer you plastic bag recycling at the Eco-Cycle/City of Boulder Center for Hard-to-Recycle Materials (known to its friends as the CHaRM).

Just like Albertsons, we'll accept #2 and #4 bags, which includes newspaper bags, all grocery bags, all dry cleaner bags, and any other bag that has the #2 or #4 inside the recycling symbol. The bags MUST be clean, dry and empty; food residue, moisture from produce or rinsing, and receipts are all serious contaminants. Following these guidelines is really important because we're able to meet exceptionally high recycling standards through our program, higher than any other bag program in the state. Thanks to our careful recyclers, our loads don't get thrown out for contamination.

And here's a special plea on bended knee: We've seen a severe increase in the number of plastic bags being left at the drop-off centers with commingled containers and coming in with curbside materials. Bags received from these sources are NOT being recycled. Not only do they have to go to the landfill because they are so contaminated with food waste, they hamper our program efforts because we have to use our non-profit dollars to pick them out and haul them as garbage. Please, please, please do NOT put plastic bags in your curbside bin or in drop-off bins-recycle them at the CHaRM only, located at 5030 "old" Pearl in Boulder and open 9-4 Monday through Saturday.

Dear Marti,
What is one to do with fire extinguishers? The household hazardous waste facility doesn't want them. Are they okay in the trash?
Thank you,
J.D.

Dear J.D.,
You can put a lid on that trash can because here's some news to get fired up about (I couldn't resist that one): Fire extinguishers are the newest material now accepted for recycling at the CHaRM.

In the past, local fire stations accepted fire extinguishers for recycling, but they were simply overburdened so the City of Boulder recently allocated funding through the trash tax for the CHaRM to accept fire extinguishers from Boulder residents at no charge (please bring ID). Because the costs are not covered for those outside of Boulder, there will be a $4 fee per extinguisher for non-city residents.

With every new material there are guidelines to follow, and those for fire extinguishers are pretty simple. We'll accept full, partially full and completely empty extinguishers of all shapes and sizes. We'll then recycle the cylinder as scrap metal.

Please don't put extinguishers in the scrap metal bins at our Boulder or Longmont drop-off centers. The government requires we follow certain procedures in preparing the cylinder for recycling so it can't be used as an illegal explosive device, and we can only do this at the CHaRM.

Of course reuse, and in this case, recharging is always better. Most extinguishers could be reused over and over, but the trouble for us is the nearest recharging company is in Denver. Check out our website and click on fire extinguishers in our Guide for Hard-to-Recycle Materials to find companies that will recharge extinguishers (while you're there, you'll find a lot of other great information on recycling unusual materials). Regularly check your extinguisher to make sure the gage is still in the green. If it isn't, it should be recharged or recycled and replaced.

Learn more about what's taken at the CHaRM, our hours of operation, and download a map to the location.

Posted July 2006