Recycling Pick-up

[Photobug]

I have a suspicion that my garbage company doesn't actually recycle the recyclables. I'm not usually home when they come to pick up the recycling, but they came a little earlier than usual today, and they were in a regular garbage truck; the guy just dumped my (carefully separated) stuff into the back of the truck in one swoop as I watched my cans and bottles and paper and cardboard merrily mix together on their way into the truck.

Is this something that companies that recycle usually do? I mean, if they're going to re-sort it when they get it back to the plant, why the list of rules and regulations about sorting?

It seems a little fishy to me, especially since the fact that they recycle and a lot of other garbage companies around here don't is a big selling point for them.

Just curious what other people's collection services do with the recycling.

[daphne]

We have a specific green truck for recycling. The guy dumps paper in one chute, then glass/plastic/metal in the other chute.

[boilermaker]

If you are really concerned, call and ask. My county does an automatic recycling, we don't even have to separate it out into different bags. But my parents put their recycling into different colored bags. Same truck picks them all up, then they are sorted at the facility. So it can be done.

But I'm sure there is more than one company out there who isn't doing it properly as well.

[Asha]

Are you sure you have to sort? My city doesn't require sorting and dumps all recycles into one truck.

[Kopper]

Where we moved from we didn't have to sort. We just had a seperate bin and a green truck picked up the recycling. In this town we don't have curbside recycling. :mad::mad::mad: I was so ticked when I found this out. There are two recycling centers that you can drop off at but that is for a town of 250,000+ :mad: My old town was 70,000 or so and we had recycling.

[attorneymom]

My city uses trucks for recycling, and separate trucks for garbage. They pick up on the same day, but come at different times.

We're supposed to separate, and I think the recycling truck has separate bins.

Unfortunately, they don't do curbside glass recycling.

[Photobug]

Are you sure you have to sort? My city doesn't require sorting and dumps all recycles into one truck.

Yes, they sent us a letter saying they would not accept any recycling that was not sorted and packaged the way they wanted it, so I thought it was weird that they'd then just toss it in the back of the truck.

I know they HAVE trucks with separate compartments, because I've seen them driving around with the company's logo. Hmm... I think I'll wait and see what they do next time and if they do the same thing, I'll call and ask about it.

[Kimberland30]

I'd call the recycling company and tell them what you saw. If in fact a truck is just picking up your sorted items and dumping them all together in the truck, you shouldn't be made to sort it in the first place...and tell them that.

If they are going to have rules like that, everyone should follow them...including whoever picks it up.

[Scooter]

Our recycling bin gets dumped into the same truck as the garbage, and it's sorted when they get back to the dump. Because the recycling is loose and not mixed into the garbage bags, they're able to sort it without too much trouble. We've got two bins because our garbage cans are small and the recycling one is huge.

Our green waste (yard waste, food scraps, the paper kind of milk cartons, cardboard with food on it) is picked up by a separate truck.

[SpelKen]

Check into it.

We paid $5 per month extra to have recycling and they never did it. My DH asked them on more than one occasion about it remaining there and the garbage man would just toss our recycling in with the trash and just shrug. We just stopped paying for the service.

[yby1]

Just ask.

Maybe they don't have a large enough fleet of trucks with different compartments, so they sent a regular truck over knowing that they would have to re-sort it? *shrugs*