Los Angeles Ups Curbside Recycling Efforts
On June 14th, Los Angeles expanded its recycling capability to include milk, juice, soup and wine cartons in efforts to reduce more than 400 tons of trash from landfills.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told the L.A. Times, “This is a big deal in the sense that we’ll be the largest city in the state that has a carton recycling program. It solidifies our position as the No. 1 recycling city in the nation.
“We’ll be at 70% by the time I leave office,” in 2013, Villaraigosa said. “That’s our goal. We want to be a zero waste city one day, and although that’s a high threshold, every year we’re working toward that.
“Since 2007, L.A. has added 440,000 multifamily households to the city’s recycling program. 75% of multifamily households, and 78% of LAUSD campuses, now have curbside recycling.
“We need to take that to 100%,” the Mayor said. “L.A. has the ignominious distinction of having some of the worst air quality in the nation. We have some of the worst traffic. We’ve got to make a greener city, and conservation of our resources is critical. People don’t want to live next to waste dumps.”
Along with current recyclables, L.A. area residents can now add both types of paper cartons typically used for nondairy/regular milks, juice, soup and wine (for refrigerated perishable juices/milks, that is paperboard coated with plastic, and for shelf-stable liquids that’s a combination of paperboard, plastic and foil).
One in every three U.S. households now has carton recycling access, compared with just one in 25 households in 1994, according to the Carton Council, a coalition of carton manufacturers responsible for setting up the carton recycling program in L.A.
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Photo: epSos.de
