What Is Your Recycling Score?

Make sure you put it into a sealed paper bag. Please do not use plastic bags as those often damage recycling equipment.

The equipment used to sort recyclables is extremely sophisticated. Plastic bags jam the machines and may cause the need for costly repairs.

In 2009, only 37% of phone directories got recycled nationwide compared to 89% of newspapers. Please make sure you recycle your phone book.

The wrappers are actually made out of plastic. Unfortunately candy wrappers are currently not recycled in residential recycling programs.

In 2009, only about half of the magazines were recycled nationwide. Please tell your friends that magazines and other glossy paper are recyclable.

Coffee filters are not recyclable, but you can compost them in your backyard.

Today’s paper mills using recycled paper have the equipment to separate plastic windows from the envelopes.

Regular paper gift wrap can be recycled, but tissue paper, flocked, glittered or foil paper cannot be recycled and must be thrown out along with plastic ribbons and bows.

Paper mills that process recovered paper are set up to remove common contaminants such as staples and paper clips from the pulped paper. Therefore, it is not necessary to remove such items before recycling the paper, although paper clips and binder clips can be removed and reused.

Please recycle *clean* pizza boxes with your paper. You cannot recycle a box that is soaked in oil or covered in cheese. Remove any food or wax paper that may be inside. If the top panel of the box is clean, you can tear it off and recycle just the top panel.

Because of the moisture barrier coatings and food residues, food service products cannot be recycled. Biodegradable products can be composted. Starbucks is currently experimenting with recyclable coffee cups, but the technology is not available in Massachusetts.

Frozen pizza, waffle, popsicle and other frozen food boxes cannot be recycled even though they may not seem any different from cereal or cracker boxes, which are recyclable. This is because a lot of them contain a chemical called wet-strength that keeps the boxes from falling apart in a cold, moist environment. Even if the food is also wrapped in plastic, like a frozen pizza, you still cannot recycle the box.

Ream wrappers are lined with a thin layer of plastic that protects the paper inside from moisture. Unfortunately this renders the wrapper impossible to recyclable.