Make a difference with Recycling, Reduce and Reuse

Recycling really does make a difference. From 1990 to 2005, recycling efforts helped decrease the amount of trash going to US landfills by 9 million ton. This is data supplied by the Environmental Protection Agency. We can help the effort by focusing on 3 simple tips: recycle, reduce and reuse.

Recycle
Besides newspapers, cans and bottle, you can also recycle magazines, glossy inserts, "junk mail" and phone books. When you are cleaning up and organizing your bills, you can also recycle those bills and receipts though you might want to shred them first to prevent identity theft. Your pizza boxes, diaper box, Amazon cardboard boxes and paper cartons such as orange juice carton, milk cartons can also be recycled. Electronics goods such as cell phones and computers can also be recycled though they may be harder to do so via your standard Waste Management Company. You can try CollectiveGood.com to recycle your PDAs, phones and pagers.

Reduce
US is the greatest paper consumer as Americans uses more than 730 pounds of paper a year. One way to reduce is in the office and you can set your printer to print double side by default. Also, for non important document, you can use the blank side of old documents for scrap paper. These days, most major companies offer online statements and by avoiding paper statements sent to your home, you can help save a lot.

Reuse
Reusing help minimize wastes. Get creative with what you got in terms of reusing. You can use plastic shopping bags as thrash bag instead of buying new thrash bags. Also, paper bags can be used to collect yard waste to be recycled as compost materials.