All those Capri Sun juice drinks students at Walnut Heights Elementary have been drinking are making money for the school. Walnut Heights is part of TerraCycle's "Drink Pouch Brigade," a free fundraising program that pays 2 cents per unit of waste collected. TerraCycle and Capri Sun have reached a major milestone in the brigade with 50 million pouches collected and a whopping $1 million paid to schools and nonprofits across the country -- just for the schools sending TerraCycle its waste.

All those Capri Sun juice drinks students at Walnut Heights Elementary have been drinking are making money for the school. Walnut Heights is part of TerraCycle's "Drink Pouch Brigade," a free fundraising program that pays 2 cents per unit of waste collected. TerraCycle and Capri Sun have reached a major milestone in the brigade with 50 million pouches collected and a whopping $1 million paid to schools and nonprofits across the country -- just for the schools sending TerraCycle its waste.

Terracycle upcycles consumer waste into new salable goods. They primarily harvest their raw material from schoolchildren as part of charity drives, though they are now placing recycling stations at certain Walmart stores. At the Walmart centers they pay 3 cents per piece, but only for a narrow range of product packaging; the website supports a wider range of recyclables. The spirit of the project is wonderful, but the problem is that it creates zombie advertising and branding for these undead consumer objects. Which is actually not all that surprising, as the Walmart program is sponsored by the very brands whose packaging are featured in the upcycled goods.

Terracycle upcycles consumer waste into new salable goods. They primarily harvest their raw material from schoolchildren as part of charity drives, though they are now placing recycling stations at certain Walmart stores. At the Walmart centers they pay 3 cents per piece, but only for a narrow range of product packaging; the website supports a wider range of recyclables.

2. Walmart installed TerraCycle recycling and garbage bins outside of New Jersey stores <http://www.causeintegration.com/2010/walmart-recycling-program-pays-cash-for-trash-with-terracycle/> , and may expand the program nationwide. TerraCycle <http://www.terracycle.net/>  takes an innovative spin on recycling and waste, taking things most people think are garbage -- like empty Capri-Sun juice bags, or Oreo cookie wrappers -- and fashioning them into cool products that kids can take to school as backpacks and more. TerraCycle has successfully "upcycled" $1.85 billion worth of garbage since its inception (and as a plug, TerraCycle is founded by a Fellow of StartingBloc <http://startingbloc.org/> , Tom Szaky).

It is called TerraCycle. TerraCycle recycles everyday products and turns them into new products. It helps the environment and your school at the same time. So far TerraCycle has collected $1,476,863.02 for charities and schools count as charities. The empty CapriSun packets collected each earn .02 cents and with every 500 collected you can send them to TerraCycle.

TerraCycle names school one of top 100 America's Best Brigade in the Drink Pouch Brigade A Woodland elementary school has earned $774.12 for collecting drink pouches and is in the top 100 collecting schools among more than 30,000 schools participating nationwide.

There is something pure genius sitting in a Wal-Mart parking lot in New Jersey and it is not Jon Bon Jovi (but I’d like it to be). It’s a giant green trash collection bin that will take all sorts of garbage you thought you couldn’t recycle … and pay you for it.

Teachers and students at Altruria Elementary used to see a lot of used Capri Sun drink pouches get thrown away. But, once they signed up for a program through TerraCycle, those once discarded pouches turned into hundreds of dollars. The school began earning two cents per pouch as part of a free nationwide program that pays schools and non-profits to collect non-recyclable waste that would otherwise go to a landfill.

Nine years later, Szaky, now 28, runs one of the fastest-growing eco-friendly manufacturers in the world. TerraCycle Inc. runs collection programs for what are commonly thought of as nonrecyclable waste materials, saving thousands of tons of waste from landfills and making things like picture frames from old bicycle chains, backpacks from cookie wrappers, and tote and messenger bags from drink pouches.