GOLD: TerraCycle TerraCycle’s business model is to eliminate waste by offering free recycling fundraisers to any school, non-profit, corporation or individual/family for any type of man-made waste. The program incentivizes the collection of common packaging and products ranging from candy wrappers to cosmetics, packaging to cigarette butts. “Brigades” collect waste that TerraCycle then turns into more than 1500 new products, ranging from recycled park benches to upcycled backpacks. These products are available online and at major retailers ranging from Walmart to Whole Foods. There are currently more than 40 programs that range from food packaging (like drink pouches and candy wrappers) to office supplies (like pens and tape dispensers) to personal products (like cosmetic and beauty packaging to diaper packaging). For every item returned, TerraCycle donates two-cents (or the local equivalent) to a school or non-profit of the collector’s choice. TerraCycle operates in 22 countries, minimizing the global threats of landfill and incineration on humans and the environment. So far, through TerraCycle, 32 million consumers have diverted 2.5 billion units of waste from landfill and incineration, while earning over 4.5 million dollars (US) for schools and myriad non- profits. For example, the drink pouch is a ubiquitous waste stream found in every school cafeteria in America. In order to offset the estimated 11 BILLION pouches that go to waste every year in America alone, TerraCycle partnered with Honest Tea and Capri Sun to start the Drink Pouch Brigade. The free recycling fundraiser was an opportunity for two competitors to put aside their corporate differences and do the right thing for the environment. Since the Program was founded, over 70,000 organizations – including 57,000 schools – signed up for the program. As of December 2012 they helped collect over 164 MILLION drink pouches and collectively earned over 3.2 million dollars. The collected pouches are upcycled or recycled into a variety of products. School items like pencil cases and backpacks that help to complete the education for kids. The students get to see what the pouches they helped collect are turned into for a second life. Pouches are also recycled into more utilitarian products like park benches, picnic tables and railroad ties. TerraCycle’s programs are sponsored by some of the world’s largest companies. These major companies include Kraft Foods, Nestle, Mars, Inc., Kimberly-Clark, Frito-Lay, Kashi, Sanford, Elmer’s Products, Inc, Logitech, Old Navy, Clif Bar, Sprout Baby Food, 3M, Malt-O-Meal, Colgate, Palmolive, L’Oreal, and BIC.

TerraCycle Triathlon of Trash Winner Gets Free UGA Semester Dedicated to the Late Jim McGown of Athens who passed away March 7 of this year. A Veteran of the U.S. Navy, and a tireless worker for the betterment of mankind whose labor and efforts were felt as far away as the Middle East! There is No Waste...Only Wasted Resources! Perhaps Earth Day Should be Every Day as we only have one Earth and without it we would be lost! St Gregory the Great Episcopal Church on the East Side has now earned almost $6,000 by keeping over 260,000 pieces of formally difficult to recycle trash out of the landfill. While Broward College near Ft. Lauderdale has now earned $15,000. Let's be honest how much sense does it make to bury unbiodegradable trash under ground from land we stole from Mother Nature? This is Varsity Recycling: TerraCycle.com is now accepting what we would normally think of as difficult or impossible to recycle. Things like Any & All: Chip Bags, Candy Wrappers, Glue Sticks, Sunscreen  and Lipstick Tubes, and now Any and All Cigarette Trash to include Stinky Cigarette Butts. Here is the Deal: From right now until August 15th, 2013 collect everything you can from the list below placing and separating each category in its own container such as a  Box, Bird Seed, or Pet Food Bag.  Feel free to get as large as you want but make sure a single average person can move the container around fairly easy through average doorways with the assistance of a hand truck. Items can be damp but not soaked and should be shaken or squeezed free of most food and liquid.(No Need To Scrub or Rinse Anything Out) Boxes and Packages will be opened for inspection. The winner with the most by weight wins a free Semester(In-State Tuition estimated to be $3,800)! Participants will meet for a Showdown on August 16th, 2013 at a location To Be Determined. For more information meet Captain PLaneT for a personal demonstration, description, and Q&A in the Odum School of Ecology Courtyard on Tuesday June 11th, 2013 at 4:00 pm! Or schedule me for a briefing at your location! If you are far away I can just email you all the UPS Shipping Labels for free shipping and TerraCycle will do the measuring. Just ask me for a label for specific brigades. The List:

1. Any & All Drink Pouches(Such as Capri-Sun, Kool-Aid to include the straws and straw wrappers)
2. Any & All Coffee Pouches(Such as Maxwell House, Equal Exchange Organic, and Starbucks)
3. Any & All Cookie and Cracker Wrappers(Such as Oreo and Keebler)
4. Any & All Energy or Breakfast Bar and Energy Food Wrappers(Such as Granola Bars, Breakfast Bars, Cliff Bars, Oddwalla Bars, Nut Bags, Kashi Bars)
5. Any & All Candy Wrappers(Such as M&Ms, Hershey, and Snickers) and Gum Wrappers(Such as Trident, Bubblicious, and Wrigley)
6. Any & All Chip and Salty Snack Bags(Such as Frito Lay, Pepperidge Farm, potato chip, crackers, pretzel, cheeto, nacho, and any that look and feel similar)
7. Any & All Lunch Kit Trays, Wrappers(such as Lunchables)
8. Any & All Dairy Tub Containers(Such as Stonyfield Farms, Chobani, Dannon) Butter Type Spread Containers (Such as Country Crock, Promise, and yes even the little baby single serve sizes along with baby coffee creamers) Sour Cream and Cottage Cheese, etc.
9. Sprout Brand Baby Food as well as Any & All Crushed Fruit Bags and Containers and Wrappers(GoGo Squeeze, Plum Organics, Gerber,  Chiquita, Ella's Kitchen, etc)
10. Any & All Cereal Bags(Such as Malt-O-Meal, Rice Crispies, and Honey Nut Cheerios)
11. Bear Naked Brand Granola and Cereal Product Wrappers
12. Any & All Corks Real and Fake Plastic from wine and other liquor bottles
13. Any & All Disposable Household Tape Dispensers (Such as Scotch Tape)
14. Any & All Home Storage Bags and Containers (such as Zip Lock Type Bags, sandwich bags, and temporary tupperware plastic containers)
15. Any & All Paper Towel and similar Paper Product Wrappers (Such as Scotts Paper Towels, Tissue Paper, Paper Napkins etc)
16. Any & All Tooth Paste Tubes, Dental Floss Devices, and used Toothbrushes (Such as Colgate, Crest, etc)
17. Any & All Glue Containers and Glue Sticks (Such as Elmer's)
18. Any & All Human Writing Instruments except Chalk and Crayons (Such as Used Up or Broken Pens, Sharpies, Markers, Highlighters, Magic Markers, and Mechanical Pencils, Wooden Pencils)
19. Any & All Beauty and Skin Care Product Tubes and Containers (Such as Aveeno and Aveda Skin Product Tubes, Neosporin Medicine Containers, Lip Stick Tubes, Cosmetic Cases,  Chap Stick Tubes, Shampoo Bottles, Deodorant Sticks and Sun Screen Tubes and Bottles)
20. Any & All Diaper Wrappers (such as Huggies, Pampers, g-Diaper and any sort of Baby Sanitation Wipe as well as Incontinence Pad Wrappers)
21. Any & All Cell Phones, MP3 players, Digital Cameras,  GPS Systems, Calculators, Printer and Toner Cartridges, and Laptop Computers including all cords and chargers
22. Any & All Cheese Wrappers (such as Kraft, Kroger, Sargento)
23. Any & All Tortilla, Tostada & Bread Wrappers (such as Mission Tortillas)
24. Any and All Home Cleaning Containers and Items (such as Method Packs, Windex, Pledge, Ajax, and Toilet Brushes, Tubes, Pistol Squeezers)
25. Any and All #5 & #6 disposable plastic drinking cup (Solo Cups)
26. Any and All Laundry and Dish Wash Detergent Briquette Bags (Dropps, Tide, Cascade)
27. Any and All Wine Pouches
28. Any and All Hummus Products (like Athenos Hummus)
29. Any and All Shoes
30. Any and All Cigarette & Cigar Waste including all the ashes, unburnt tobacco, filter stubs, plastic outer wrap, aluminum paper inner wrap. (Please place in an airtight plastic bag inside the outer package)

TerraCycle featured on WLTX (CBS)

Habitat for Humanity of Evansville is partnering with TerraCycle to make our community a better place to live! Habitat for Humanity of Evansville is currently collecting previously non-recyclable or hard to recycle waste. For each piece of garbage that you are able to recycle through Habitat, TerraCycle will provide a donation that will go directly to our mission of providing homes, communities and hope.

Recycling has been one of the biggest movements in response to pollution, and dealing with the huge amounts of waste produced by today’s society. Of the biggest problems with recycling is that there are a lot of plastics, and other products that aren’t recyclable yet. A lot of progress has happened recently in recycling abilities, but there are many products and luxuries that we use today that come in packaging that isn’t easily recycled. This is where the company Terracycle comes in. Terracycle is a company that collects hard to recycle wastes and either recycles the materials, or upcylces them for new purposes.

Nestled in the lowly depths of Trenton, NJ TERRACYCLE has been reusing waste for over a decade, giving it back to the consumer in the form of backpacks, non biohazardous cleaning products, scrapbooks, enviornmentally friendly fertilizers, and more. Check out this IPAD case made from what TERRACYCLE terms “upcycled” materials (think potato chip bags, and cliff bar wrappers). Triple nice!

Back to school, means back to packing a lunch for lots of families around the Tennessee Valley. It also means lots of Capri Sun, granola bar, and chip bag wrappers that can't be recycled. Oops, uh, check that last statement. " Nexus Energy Center, we participate in a program through a company called Teracycle, based in New Jersey. What they do is take all sorts of random items that are typically un-recyclable, we're talking about granola bar wrappers, chip bags, pens, yogurt containers, things that we can't put in our blue recycle bins at home," said Daniel Tait, of the Nexus Energy Center in Huntsville. The items are shipped off to Teracycle and turned in to all kinds of cool things like backpacks, purses, toys and lawn furniture just to name a few.

A new initiative by LVC’s Sustainability Committee provides a unique way to upcycle products typically thrown away on campus. TerraCycle creates collection and solution programs for non-recyclable waste, and will be rolled out on campus in time for move in day. Residential Life area coordinator Michael Schoch is spearheading the TerraCycle effort on campus, along with his “green team” of resident assistants, building representatives, and Sustainability Committee members. “The TerraCycle project is another opportunity for LVC to continue to become as sustainable as possible, Schoch said. “It is the team’s hope that we can reduce waste on campus by educating our community about new items that can be upcycled instead of being thrown into general waste. In turn, by simply changing behavior, we will be able to collect points/money and send them off to charities.” Schoch has prior experience with a successful TerraCycle program. During his graduate studies at Millersville University he worked closely with a professor to implement upcyling within a residence hall on campus. “It is my hope to include and encourage the LVC campus community to get involved and contribute to a more sustainable society.”

I speak for many of our eco citizens and dedicated environmentalist when I say that it pains me to throw anything away, but unfortunately, there are just some things that just can’t be recycled. Chip bags, candy wrappers, tape dispensers and used pens all have to go into the trash… or normally would… Thanks to the company TerraCycle, hard-to-recycle items like those listed above are not trashed, but are actually recycled, or even upcycled. TerraCycle partners with the companies that produce these items, and works with them to create an environmentally friendlier end of life- which means that for many of them, they are turned into something completely new-for example, pens and sharpies are turned into dry erase marker holders, and cookie wrappers are turned into backpacks. Awesome, right? Wait- it gets better.