Here at TTF, we talk a lot about how recycling can help to protect our waterways. Our Ethical Electronics Recycling Events help keep dangerous chemicals from electronics from leaching into our creeks and rivers. But what about plastics? From all of our work doing stream cleanups, we’ve found that a huge percentage of the trash we pick up is plastic — usually in the form of food or beverage packaging materials and plastic bags. (The City of Philadelphia currently recycles plastics #1 and #2, but not #3-#7. Montgomery County has different regulations.)
This month’s Grid magazine has an article on where Philadelphia residents can recycle plastics #3-7:
Because No. 5 is the next most common plastic (after 1 and 2), Weaver’s Way Co-op (weaversway.coop) collects it—including Brita filters—as part of the “Gimme 5” campaign. Plastics must be clean, dry and clearly stamped with the number 5. Collections take place on the third Saturday of each month at the Co-op’s garage (524 Carpenter Lane), and all the plastics are then shipped to the Gimme 5 processing facility in New York State. The South Street Whole Foods (929 South Street) also collects No. 5 plastics.
The other numbers are trickier. The foam variety of No. 6–Polystyrene and the dreaded No. 7–Other categories are notoriously difficult to recycle. But Recycling Services, Inc. (365 Elm Street, Pottstown, 610-323-8545) takes all comers (numbers 1 through 7), and the facility is open for public collection on Tuesdays and Saturdays (9 a.m. to 1 p.m.). They charge an $8/car gate fee, so consider loading up with your neighbors’ No. 3 through 7s, too, before you head out there.
If you drink a lot of bottled beverages, you can recycle the caps at the Big Green Earth Store (934 South Street) and at Aveda stores throughout the Philadelphia region (the Shops at Liberty Place, Cherry Hill Mall, Willow Grove Park and Exton Square).
And, in addition to recycling plastic, we can just try to use it less — especially when it comes to unnecessary purchases like bottled water!
Thank you SO much to all of our amazing volunteers and to everyone who came out and ethically recycled their e-waste this past weekend!
During the drive the parking lot of Cedarbrook Elementary School, normally empty on a weekend, was crowded with people and piled high with “e-waste” –old computers, TVs, radios, stereo equipment, toasters, and other used electronics that had reached the end of their useful lives.
Over the course of the weekend, over 150 families brought old electronics by the carload and paid $1 per pound to have them recycled ethically.
By Sunday afternoon, over 11,000 pounds of used electronics were packed up for shipping to facilities that will redistribute the use-able items to people who can use them, harvest working parts from broken components, and forward unsalvageable items to carefully chosen U.S. operations that recycle e-waste in accordance with the highest international standards (more information at www.ban.org). Over the past two years, TTF has helped to ethically recycle over 50,000 pounds of e-waste!
The-waste drive is the brainchild of Christopher Swain (pictured above), the first person in history to swim the entire lengths of several dirty waterways including the Columbia River, the Charles River, the Hudson River, and Lake Champlain to raise awareness about clean water issues. Cheltenham a stop on the way for Swain, who is currently swimming 1000 miles down the Atlantic coast from Marblehead, Massachusetts to Washington, DC. The ocean swim is part of his TOXTOURTM project (www.toxtour.org), an ongoing campaign to collect and recycle, ethically, one billion pounds of e-waste, to prevent toxic chemicals and heavy metals from fouling the world’s waterways and ecosystems.
A special thanks to our hard working crew from Arcadia University!
You can view more photos from the event in our Facebook album.
TTF will be joining forces once again with swimmer/activist Christopher Swain for an e-waste drive on November 21 and 22 at Cedarbrook Middle School (more info here).
Christopher is currently swimming 1000 miles of the East Coast to raise awareness for clean water issues. In the days leading up to our e-waste drive, Christopher will speak to local school children about his swim and what they can do to help keep our waterways clean.
This video gives a sense of Christopher and what he’s trying to accomplish:
For more information on Christopher Swain or our upcoming e-waste drive, contact Katie at katie@ttfwatershed.org.
Check out all this cool e-waste news from the most recent PennFuture newsletter:
Podcast of the Week: Your computer’s dead. Now what?
In this week’s podcast, PennFuture’s western Pennsylvania Outreach Coordinator Joylette Portlock takes you on an audio tour of eLoop LLC, an ethical electronics recycling firm in Plum Borough, just outside of Pittsburgh. You’ll hear Ned Eldridge, eLoop’s president and CEO; Penny Holden, vice president of sales; and Jimmi Burns, director of operations, describe the recycling process step-by-step. You’ll learn exactly how our electronic waste the fastest growing waste stream in the world should be disposed of. Turns out our televisions, computers, cell phones, PDAs, printers, etc., are full of toxic chemicals that must be disposed of as hazardous waste, and precious metals and other valuable components that can be reused.
Unfortunately, there is no law in Pennsylvania banning all this electronic waste from our landfills. But that could change. Two e-recycling bills currently before the Pennsylvania General Assembly – HB 708 and SB 816. These bills will require manufacturers of electronics to take back their old products and arrange for them to be responsibly recycled. HB 708 has been approved by the House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee and could be scheduled for a vote by the full House soon. SB 816 is currently before the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee.
In late June, PennFuture, eLoopLLC, and the Pennsylvania Resources Council held a special electronics recycling event as part of the Black and Gold City Goes Green Campaign. With just a few days notice, more than 350 Pittsburghers brought their old electronics to Heinz Field and paid to recycle three truckloads – about 20 tons – of old televisions, computers and more. The effort kept between six and seven tons of lead out of landfills.
Here’s an interesting e-waste article from the New York Times. This one focuses mostly on the confusing patchwork of state laws regarding e-waste. Exactly whose responsibility is it? State governments? The federal government? Electronics manufacturers? Electronics consumers?
From the article:
The E.P.A. estimates that 2.6 million tons of electronic waste were dropped into landfills in 2007, the most recent year for which data is available. Once buried, the waste leaches poisons and heavy metals into soil and groundwater.
Recycling programs do not address the problem of electronics that are already leaching poison in landfills. Nor do they prevent the frequent shipment of plastic shells covered with chemical flame retardants overseas to poor and developing nations; once there, they are often incinerated, because they cannot be reused, and spew toxic chemicals into the air.
The Office of the Inspector General at the Justice Department has a continuing investigation into accusations that several federal prisons with electronics recycling contracts had used inmates to do the work without taking adequate safety precautions, exposing them to unhealthy levels of airborne particles.
Ultimately, said Ms. Kyle, coordinator of the Electronics TakeBack Coalition, recycling does not eliminate the root problem: the vast amount of electronics generated in the first place and fated for disposal.
FRONTLINE/World had a great special on electronics recycling the other night. It describes the terrifying world of the global e-waste trade and traces what happens to American electronics once they are shipped to developing countries where people — including young children — incinerate them and rummage through them for parts. The program’s website has some great resources as well, including an interactive map on the global e-waste trade and guidance on e-waste laws and ethical recycling options. E-waste is a huge threat to our waterways but unfortunately, most people aren’t even aware its hazards and the importance of recycling electronics as ethically as possible.
We wanted to give a great big THANK YOU to everyone who came out for our ethical electronics recycling event this weekend, especially our hardworking volunteers. We’ll be posting detailed coverage of the event shortly, but in the meantime, here are a few of your questions answered.
Many of the people who dropped off their electronics had questions and because we were so busy, we didn’t always get the chance to answer every question in as great detail as we might have wanted. Here is a brief recap that answers the most common questions we heard.
Our Ethical Electronics Recycling event was part of Christopher Swain’s TOXTOUR. On April 22, 2009, Christopher will begin a 1000-mile swim down the Atlantic coast to Washington, DC. Along the way, he will work with thousands of students and citizens to implement projects designed to improve the health of our ocean planet.
Several people mentioned they had seen a 60 Minutes expose that tracked e-waste that was shipped to China. We can assure you that not one scrap of e-waste you dropped off was shipped to a developing country or dumped in a landfill. Christopher works with several different recyclers in the United States that make sure nothing we collect is incinerated as solid waste, tipped into landfills or sent to developing countries where it can hurt people, animals and the environment. All of the recyclers used have signed the Basel Action Network’s Pledge of True Stewardship [.pdf]. Here is some more information on the Basel Action Network from the very same 60 Minutes piece:
In an ideal world, all municipalities would guarantee that electronic waste is recycled ethically. However, that is not the current reality. This means that we have to pay to get our e-waste recycled in an ethical manner. If that makes you angry, contact your representatives to push for ethical recycling in your area. And please don’t stop at the local level: As of now, unlike the 27 countries in the European Union, the United States has not passed legislation providing a national system to finance and responsibly deal with toxic e-waste.
To find a certified ethical recycler in your area, see the Basel Action Network’s “Find Your Local e-Stewards.”
And be sure to check back here for more information on our VERY SUCCESSFUL event!
TTF Watershed Partnership Hosts Ethical Electronics Recycling Event to Protect World’s Waterways
Ethical Electronics Recycling at Cedarbrook Middle School
on Saturday and Sunday, March 28 & 29, 11am-3pm
Next Spring, Massachusetts resident Christopher Swain will dive into the Atlantic Ocean in Gloucester, Massachusetts, and begin a 1000-mile swim to Washington, DC, in an effort to plead the case for protecting the world’s oceans.
But first, he’ll visit Philadelphia and Montgomery County Schools with the Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership (TTF).
The forty year-old father of two puts it this way: “We live on a water planet. If we want to live healthy lives, we need to go the distance to protect and restore the waters that we all depend on. I’ve decided to do just that: go the distance–all the way to Washington to plead the case of the oceans. Along the way, I want to help schoolchildren find ways to make our water planet a healthier place to live.”
The ocean swim is part of Christopher Swain’s TOXTOUR project, an ongoing campaign to collect and recycle, ethically, one billion pounds of used electronics. Discarded computers, TVs, telephones, etc., commonly known as “e-waste,” are full of toxic chemicals and heavy metals that are fouling the world’s waterways and ecosystems.
Swain, an environmental educator, was the first person in history to swim the entire lengths of several dirty waterways including the Columbia River, the Charles River, the Hudson River, and Lake Champlain—all in support of clean water.
Last December, the Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership (TTF) collaborated with Swain to collect over 10,500 pounds of e-waste at their ethical electronics recycling eventTM at Cheltenham Middle School.
In addition to collecting e-waste, TTF runs dozens of programs and workshops designed to connect residents to their local creeks, rivers and streams—from rain barrel workshops and stream clean-ups, to their model neighborhood project, combining neighborhood beautification with stormwater management and watershed education.
Since 2007, Swain has led carbon-neutral, ethical electronics recycling events and cross-curricular projects in schools throughout the Northeast. Upon his return to Montgomery County, he will work with students at schools in Abington, Cheltenham, Jenkintown and Philadelphia.
During his school visits, Swain will report on last year’s ethical electronics recycling event and discuss his upcoming ocean swim. And in small groups, Swain will work with students to problem-solve ways to make their everyday activities and purchases more ocean-friendly.
Says Karen Shaffran, a science teacher at Cedarbrook Middle School, “We teach our students that there are a variety of threats to the world’s oceans, but that two of the biggest are global warming and toxic pollution.”
On Saturday and Sunday, March 28 and 29, from 11am to 3pm, rain or shine, TTF will host an ethical electronics recycling event at Cedarbrook Middle School at 300 Longfellow Road in Wyncote, PA. Members of the public can recycle their used electronics for a fee of $1 per pound.
Items that will be accepted at the event include: Televisions, Computers, Monitors, Keyboards, Drives, Cables, Cords, Peripherals, Copiers, Printers, Cartridges, Fax Machines, Scanners, Laptops, Stereo Equipment, Speakers, CD & DVD Players, Telephones, Remote Controls, VCR’s, Projectors, Digital Cameras, PDAs, Speakers, Radios, Answering machines, Camcorders, Electric Typewriters, Video Game Systems, Pagers, Microwaves, Toasters, Ink Cartridges, USB Media, and Magnetic Media like Zip Disks, Audio Tapes, and Floppy Diskettes.
Nothing collected at the event will be tipped into landfills, incinerated as solid waste, or dumped in developing countries. That’s what the majority of the fee ensures.
Net proceeds will benefit the Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership’s environmental programs in local schools.
“Borders and labels aside,” Swain says, “We are one people sharing one watershed. We are islanders, surrounded by ocean. In the end, every choice we make affects our entire world.”
For more information please contact: Christopher Swain, TOXTOUR Team Leader at: www.toxtour.org or 617-233-4120, or Sarah RobbGrieco at sarah@ttfwatershed.org.
TTF Watershed Partnership, Inc.
One Awbury Road
Awbury Arboretum
Philadelphia, PA 19138 info@ttfwatershed.org
