Recycling Paper Will Give The Program A Shot

It's finally happening.
In about a month, the Highlands County Recycling Department will begin to accept office paper and junk mail after a hiatus of about four years. The news gets better. No sorting will be required for most paper products.

Residents and businesses, of course, will have to drop off the items in the recycling bins around town, but we have no doubt that many won't mind.
To those who wonder why the change matters, consider the numbers.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, paper is believed to have accounted for 40.4 percent of American household waste seven years ago.

That's about 71.6 million tons, gobbling up about 143.2 tons of wood. Think of how much wood -- even the harvested sort -- that can be conserved during a successful recycling program.
What's making recycling of paper possible in Highlands County is actually a growing trend that does not require tedious sorting of waste before it is shipped off for recycling, a labor-intensive job that forced the county to limit how much office paper it could take in.

Current technology, being actively used by some cities like San Francisco, now allows residents and businesses to commingle their waste for later sorting, and has helped raise recycling rates to about 70 percent in San Francisco, according to wikipedia.com.

Hopefully, Highlands County, which currently maintains a no-frills recycling program, will be able to hook up to some of this technology.

So far, whatever we have here in Highlands County is working as the recycling department posted record revenues. Ability to recycle glass should be the next step. We are waiting for that announcement to be made.