January 20th, 2009 by Tisha

While I was attempting to gather information on my piles of sorted paper products, it came to my attention, as has in the past, this problem of definition of PLASTICS.  When I took my delectable Amy’s Frozen Dinner out of its cardboard package, I thought to myself, “Self, what in the world do you do with this plastic?”  What type of plastic is it?  Can I combine it with the other plastics that I will have to haul up to Colorado Springs (since there is currently NO plastic recycling in Pueblo, a town of over 150,000 people)?

So, onto our next area of research, plastics.  The types SEEM to be:

1.  Super-thin plastic wrap (i.e. Saran Wrap)
2.  Relatively-thin plastic wrap (i.e. what frozen TV dinners come wrapped in)
3.  Thin plastics (i.e. the lids of Starbucks coffee cups)
4.  Numbers 1 and 2 plastics (i.e. water bottles)
5.  Higher numbers of plastics (i.e.  Tubs of yogurt/ice cream/BubbleYum bubble gum buckets)
6.  Even higher numbers of plastics – the really hard stuff (i.e. Polycarbonate bottles, and three-gallon paint buckets)

Let us move towards defining all of these different plastics and seeking some solution, locally and nationally, to can keep them out of our oceans and out of landfills.

My sickening inspiration for this plastic journey?

Toxic Series

plastic, recycle, Recycling