Good news!
TerraCycle Ireland can now accept even more of your hard-to-recycle waste.
How come? Thanks to Zero Waste Box, our all-inclusive recycling solution! With Zero Waste Box, you can recycle all kinds of waste not accepted by your local facilities. From coffee pods, mascara tubes and soft plastics like crisp packets, with Zero Waste Box you can recycle most of your ‘un-recyclable’ rubbish.
Fun fact…just because an item says it's unrecyclable, it doesn't mean it isn't technically recyclable. It just means your civic amenity doesn't have the financial capacity to recycle that item. More on this later!
But wait…I thought it was now possible to put soft plastics in my normal recycling bins?
While it is true your soft plastics are now accepted in your household recycling bins in Ireland, it doesn't mean they will 100% get recycled. Pauline McDonagh, a spokesperson for MyWaste told the Journal, “it’s hoped that around half of soft plastics will be recycled and the rest will be burned to generate [waste-to-energy]. By recycling with our Zero Waste Boxes you can be certain all your waste will be recycled within Ireland and won't be diverted to incineration or sold to another country. While incineration (aka recovery or waste-to-energy) has been talked about as being a perfect solution for our recyclable waste, incinerators actually emit more CO₂ (per megawatt-hour) than coal, natural gas or oil-fired power plants.* Use this informative graphic of the Waste Management Hierarchy developed by the European Union’s Waste Framework Directive which classifies waste disposal systems from the most to least preferable as a guide to disposing of your waste.
What can I do to recycle more?
Public recycling is economically motivated, so many commonly used items aren’t accepted in your regular recycling bin because they cost too much to process and/or there isn’t an end market for the material. However, TerraCycle® has proven everything is technically recyclable, including old toothbrushes, contact lens packaging, worn-in shoes, and medicine blister packs, and then works to turn the resultant material into new products.
Recycling is expensive, and public recycling is funded by taxes. TerraCycle® works around these limitations in two ways. Through partnerships with conscious companies who sponsor innovative National Recycling Programmes, free for collectors to use via public drop-off locations or private collection points.
For the busy collector seeking a simple recycling solution straight from their home or workplace, particularly for waste streams that don’t fit in a brand-sponsored recycling programme, Zero Waste Box™ has got you covered! This is an easy-to-use option for households, schools, businesses, facilities, and events looking to lighten their plastic footprint.
Many consumers love using Zero Waste Box because of its simplicity: recycling directly from your home, office or facility without having to take your waste to a drop-off location. In a recent customer survey in the UK, 97.5% of customers said Zero Waste Box positively impacted their homes.
Simply select and order a Zero Waste Box based on what you’d like to recycle, fill the box with your waste and ship it back by arranging a collection using the prepaid return label affixed to the box! (No drop-off necessary.)
The key reason TerraCycle® and Zero Waste Box™ are able to recycle almost everything is the fact that someone is willing to pay for it. More and more, businesses and consumers are waking up to how detrimental our plastic addiction is to our planet and the need to take responsibility for it. By creating access to solutions, TerraCycle® aims to show the world the magic of putting more material to good use.
Sources: