VT has banned single-use plastic bags from landfill disposal. Does that mean “film plastic” is out of our lives? Not necessarily. We acquire film plastic regularly, whether we want it or not – produce bags, bread bags, Ziploc bags, etc… While you may see a chasing arrows symbol (you know, the kind that makes you think something is recyclable?) on any one of those plastic bags mentioned above that doesn’t mean that they can be recycled in regular, blue bin recycling or at the WSWMD Transfer Station.
There are, in fact, companies in some parts of the country that deal with these types of plastic and turn them into a useful product, but they are not processing film plastic from the Material Recovery Facility (MRF) in Rutland that deals with your regular single-stream recycling. Confusing right?
Plastic bags and film plastic are enemy number one in the regular recycling bins. This is because the system at the MRF that recycles your aluminum cans, paper, cardboard, glass jars, and plastic containers uses a series of conveyor belts, blowers, magnets, vacuums, and many, many spinning elements. Plastic bags and film snag up the system and shut the whole facility down for hours at a time so that somebody can physically pull it out putting themselves in danger of injury. Think of a vacuum cleaner all bound up with pet and human hair… That’s kind of what it’s like at the MRF that deals with your various recycling streams. Within the 18 towns that comprise the Windham Solid Waste Management District, in SE Vermont, no transfer station, including WSWMD in Brattleboro, accepts film plastic/plastic bags. Please make sure you do not put plastic bags or film – yes even bubble wrap, in our recycling bins.
So what can you do with film plastic? The NexTrex program collects this type of plastic from various grocery stores in the area that haul it back to their distribution center to be baled and marketed. Here is their find-a-drop-off webpage: https://nextrex.com/view/
And here is their acceptable items list webpage: https://nextrex.com/view/
Thanks for doing your part and keeping film plastic out of regular recycling. Want to see how the Rutland MRF operates? Check out WSWMD’s video that gives you an inside look: https://www.youtube.com/watch?