My Turn: A new recycling program to begin in Gaston County
Just when you thought things couldn’t get any better, things are. Gaston County Solid Waste and Recycling, together with Keep Gastonia Beautiful and Food Lion will be working with TREX to reclaim plastic bags, plastic overwrap (from cases of water or soda), dry cleaning bags, bubble wrap, plastic mailers (like the envelopes from Amazon), plastic sleeves that your Gaston Gazette comes in, clean plastic bags from the vegetables you buy at the grocery store, cereal bag liners, ice bags, clean Ziploc and other resealable bags and bread bags.
I had written and article a while back, reminding you all that these bags can be returned to some area stores. Well, we know how hard it is to remember to bring recyclables with you to the grocery store… but now, you can consolidate your recycling efforts to one stop recycling. All of the Gaston County convenience sites will roll out new recycling boxes for this plastic the week of November 15th in honor of America Recycles Day. Yeah!
TREX company will receive these bags and process them into their board material. If you are not familiar with the TREX products, they are a leading company in the world of reclaiming and recycling. Their products are made from 95% recycled plastic and industrial wood waste. Our plastic bag recycling will be fed back into their system. They have diverted over one billion pounds of these materials each year from landfills. And now, Gaston County will have the opportunity to assist in these efforts. One of the benefits (aside from the plastics that WON’T end up in our landfill) is that TREX will donate back to Keep Gastonia Beautiful, one bench for every 1000 pounds of plastic collected (per year). We hare hoping that you will soon see TREX benches throughout our community, reminding you that there is a great purpose that you can see, in recycling your flexible plastic.
There will be handouts available as well as a poster at each site. Take a minute to familiarize yourself with the “YES” and “NO” plastics. Since this is film only, there is still no place for rigid plastic containers like those from salad and fruit. Until there is a way to divert and recycle, these must still be put into your household trash.
Just so you know that TREX means what they say, they have just completed a new global headquarters in Virginia with more than 200 employees, 64,000 square feet of space with solar panels on the roof, energy efficient lighting and soon, EV charging stations in the parking lot. They were able to achieve a Silver LEED status with this complex. What makes this product so environmentally substantial is first, their use of a material we need to recycle; second, this product stands up to environmental conditions better than wood decking, requiring no additional staining or painting for waterproofing. Relatively maintenance free, this product really helps to close that recycling circle. And now, you can help. Bring those plastic films when you visit our recycling centers. We will move this product to our partner in recycling, Food Lion, where they will transport to the proper facility and then to TREX. Partnerships are really the way to a better future: Gaston County Solid Waste and Recycling-Keep Gastonia Beautiful-Food Lion-TREX. If you have questions about this program, call me at 704-922-7729.
Nan Kirlin in the recycling coordinator for Gaston County.
This article originally appeared on The Gaston Gazette: My Turn: A new recycling program to begin in Gaston County
