Recycle in Brattleboro

From Brattleboro Community Brain Trust

1 Recycling in Brattleboro

Recycling in Brattleboro

First, let's talk about recycling bins. You can get a recycling bin by going down to the Municipal Center and visiting the Finance Office on the 2nd floor. We don't know why the Finance Department is trustee of the recycling bins, but we do know that you can pick one up there any time the office is open for free, no questions asked. So if you don't have a bin, get yourself one today. Call 251-8103 for information.

Recycling pickup is every two weeks in town collection areas. The collection schedules for trash as well as recycling are on the Town Trash and Recycling page.

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What You CAN Put In The Recycling Bin

Newspapers (inserts too)
Junk mail (plastic wrap, pieces removed)
Mixed office paper
Magazines
Books w/out hard covers
Envelopes (windows okay)
Phone books
Corrugated cardboard, clean, dry, flattened
Brown paper bags
Boxboard (e.g. cereal boxes, pasta boxes, shoe boxes)
Glass bottles and jars
Aluminum cans
Steel (Tin) cans
Plastic bottles with a neck (all #s), rinsed

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What You CAN'T Put In The Recycling Bin

NO: Aseptic boxes (e.g. drink boxes, soymilk, boxed wine)
NO: Milk cartons
NO: Tissues
NO: Tyvek (non-tearing) envelopes
NO: Egg cartons
NO: Paper Towels
NO: Waxed cardboard
NO: Plastic bags
NO: Plastic lids
NO: Plastic tubs (e.g. yogurt, margarine)
NO: Styrofoam
NO: Light bulbs
NO: Window glass
NO: Ceramics
NO: Pyrex
NO: Kitchenware

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Things You Can Recycle Other Ways

With the goal of reducing our overall trash to recycling ratio, here are a few more items that we can't get rid of curbside, but can dispose of elsewhere. These include those "problem" items such as compact fluorescent light bulbs and cell phone batteries.

Plastic grocery bags: Can be recycled at Hannaford's and most grocery stores.

Cell phone and rechargeable batteries: Radio Shack will recycle Nickel Cadmium (Ni-Cd), Nickel Metal Hydride (Ni-MH), Lithium Ion (Li-ion) batteries as well as Small Sealed Lead Acid (Pb) batteries of up to two pounds. WSWM will also take them free of charge. These types of batteries should not be thrown in the trash. However, recent-vintage alkaline batteries can be thrown away -- there's been no mercury in them since 1996.

Compact Fluorescent and Other Light bulbs: Ace Hardware (Brown & Roberts) as well as True Value Hardware (Leader and Fireside) will allow you drop off up to six compact fluorescent bulbs per visit for recycling as part of a State of Vermont mercury reduction program. Don't throw compact fluorescent, regular fluorescent, neon, ultraviolet or other speciality light bulbs in the trash.

Electronics (tvs, computers, microwaves): Windham Solid Waste Management will take these off your hands for a fee of approximately $10, more or less depending on the size of the item.

Toner Cartridges: Staples will pay you $3 per cartridge for any you return to their store.

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Things You Can Compost

Yes, Dorothy, you can compost your garbage or at least a lot of it. Turn your yucky garbage into dirt by throwing it in a pile or bin and letting it decay. There's lots of scientific information about composting on the web and elsewhere but in fact, all you really have to do to get started is decide on a method of containment and start throwing things in. Don't forget to turn your compost once in a while to keep it "working." Here are some great throwaways to compost:

Paper towels and napkins Egg cartons Vegetable peelings and parings Food scraps Coffee grounds and used tea bags Egg shells Windham Solid Waste has a nice page on composting with backyard composting approaches for Lazy Composters, Green Thumbs, and Scientists. See Composting Your Garbage.

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