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Big things are usually taken care of in the repurposing or recycling cycles but there are those little bits and pieces that literally fall through the cracks of the normal council recycling methods. Yes, you're supposed to take the tops off milk bottles and lids off jars before putting them into recycling bins or bags.
So what do you do with small items? I'll talk about a few common ones. I have in my distant past, opened up heaps of used coffee pods to scoop out the coffee grounds when I was into natural body care. Then I mixed the coffee grounds with a neutral base like unscented bodywash (e.g. Cetaphil, QV) to make a great body scrub. I don't know if it's true but it felt like my skin woke up from the residual caffeine. I'm not too sure that it was the best thing to go down the shower drain though. But if you can't be bothered to empty pods, then luckily the coffee pod companies are taking the responsibility for their own waste without the hard work. This is great as aluminum is fully recyclable endlessly. Wine bottle screw caps and necks can be recycled for money - either for yourself or for Lions charity. Bottle tops or jar lids (plastic or metal) can be collected by Sustainability Trust as part of a trial at the moment. You can also drop them off at Mt Vic Hub (opposite Clyde Quay School in Elizabeth Street) or Sustainability Trust in Forresters Lane). Let me know if there are any other small annoying things you want to recycle. Check out Metal page for more on coffee pods, wine bottle tops, lids and caps recycling. It may seem strange that we are going to send more plastic to general rubbish but that's what we will be doing later this month. That's because we can no longer send all types of plastic overseas for recycling. But there is good news ... since we can't recycle as many plastics as before, then we can focus upfront on our purchases and buy things with less disposable plastic. It's easier these days to get bulk bin, takeaways or deli items in your own containers. Beeswax wraps are an easy way to reduce your use of cling film. You can make your own (melt beeswax in an old roasting tin and lay your 100% cotton squares quickly and then hang up to dry) or buy locally made wraps online/in shops. When they're past their best, cut them up and compost them. You could also choose products that are stored in recyclable materials like glass, aluminum or tin. More info on:
I remember reading an article years ago about how Japan were mining their landfills and urban waste for gold and other precious metals. Then there was a short film shown by the Japanese Embassy last year on how the Tokyo Olympic 2021 medals were made from recycled metals including gold from the donations of mobile phones from Japanese people. What an amazing achievement to recycle so many small electronic devices!
Precious metals recycling intrigued me so I was happy to see an article this year on how to mine your own home for precious metals and minerals. I'm sure that many of us during lock down decluttered or attempted to declutter our homes as charity shops reported huge intakes of goods, like what they receive post-Christmas. But did any of you know what items to recycle for precious metal retrieval? It was good to see that kiwi ingenuity sparked a start up this year in Auckland to mine metals too from old technology. This means that our e-waste doesn't have to be sent to the Northern Hemisphere which passes the responsibility to recycle back to us. Of course, they try to repurpose first. Which leads me to my new page on Metal. Have a look and let me know what you think.
Well, I'm slowly building up this website but it'll take time. I'm not sure whether this is a Pantene or a Mainland ad amount of time but let's see. It will take time for me to fix the images so that the text is easier to see.
Please contact me on the Contact page if you have any comments or news. |