Don’t Let Your Scrap Plastic End Up Like Curbside Recyclables
Wouldn’t it be interesting if scrap commercial plastic were recycled just like the glass bottles and plastic food containers you put to the curb? Actually, it wouldn’t. Curbside recycling programs are so notoriously bad that attempting to deal with commercial plastic the same way would be a disaster. Thank goodness there are better ways to recycle commercial plastic waste.
Theoretically, recycling residential plastic is a noble cause worth pursuing. But in practical terms, it does not work. We cannot do with residential plastics what we can do with their commercial counterparts. We have neither the means nor the infrastructure to do it cost-effectively.
On the other hand, recycling certain types of commercial plastic waste is pretty easy. It is in keeping with that idea that we urge you not to allow your scrap plastic to end up like the curbside recyclables you put out every week. Let us buy it from you instead.
A Pretty Simple Process
Recycling scrap plastic produced by commercial enterprises is a pretty simple process. Let’s say you run a plastics plant that specializes in injection molding. Every piece your machines produce comes with scrap material that has to be removed. Your company generates more scrap whenever the machines have to be purged.
Your plastic waste is easy to recycle. It is clean and pure. It hasn’t been contaminated with other plastics, metals, etc. Provided your company is in one of the seven states we service we could come right to your facility and pick up the scrap. It would cost you nothing. We might even be willing to pay you for it, depending on what it actually is.
We would haul the scrap away, freeing up storage space and eliminating the need for you to dispose of it in your dumpster. Your scrap would go back to our plant where it would be shredded and turned into plastic regrind. And by the way, you could purchase regrind from us as well. Plastic regrind can be added back into the manufacturing process by combining it with the virgin plastic pellets your company normally utilizes.
What We Recycle
The key to making commercial plastic recycling successful is understanding what recyclers want. We do not recycle every kind of plastic because not all plastics have a good resale market. In addition to purge and injection mold waste, we also recycle:
- plastic skids and pallets
- totes and plastic bins
- scrap plastic buckets
- baled PET bottles.
The one thing all of these items have in common is that they are what we call ‘clean’ plastics. They are clean in the sense that they are not contaminated by other materials. They also do not have to be separated from paper, glass, and other materials. A load of plastic pallets doesn’t contain any other materials we can’t use. So it’s very simple for us to turn it into regrind.
Your Curbside Recyclables
One final note about those curbside recyclables: the vast majority of them never make it to recycling plants that turn them into usable products. Most of what goes into your curbside recycling bin ends up in a landfill or incinerator. Why? Because it doesn’t take much to contaminate an entire load of consumer plastics. There isn’t enough money in consumer plastics to go to the trouble of decontaminating them.
End of life is not a good time for consumer plastics. Commercial plastic waste is another matter. If your company produces easily recycled plastic waste, do not let it wind up like those curbside recyclables. Let us take it off your hands. We can use it.