In just over a year and a half, 21 The North Face® stores across the country have recycled more than one million plastic polybags through a program with upcycling and recycling pioneer, TerraCycle. The Troy store on West Big Beaver Road is one of the stores that has contributed to keeping the one million bags or 20 tons out of landfills. Through this program, The North Face, the world’s premier supplier of authentic, innovative and technically advanced outdoor apparel, equipment and footwear, and TerraCycle are actively pursuing a solution to a common packaging waste problem in the apparel industry.

Becker first found out about TerraCycle on a Keebler cookie wrapper. Shortly afterwards, she read an article about the company in Parade Magazine, and then Becker got busy.   Now many items thought to be difficult to recycle are being collected and Becker has a lot of help.   +Save Second Base team member Sandy Wilmot and Becker's sister-in-law, Deanna Becker, coordinated efforts at schools to collect snack chip bags. Some local and area Subway and Head West restaurants are collecting bags in decorative pink boxes.   +Becker's daughter, Danielle Love, who operates Love's Hair Shack in Macon, Ill., and sells Mary Kay beauty products, recently held a "Trash Bash," encouraging anyone to bring in old mascara and lipstick containers and other skin care and makeup containers.   +Last summer, Unser and some friends and family members collected over 1,750 red Solo Cups from the Morrisonville Picnic and Homecoming. The Springfield Sliders baseball team held a similar promotion, with Unser collecting the refuse in designated boxes.   Becker and other members of her Relay For Life team, Save Second Base, have signed up for a number of other collection items, or "brigades," including dairy tubs (cottage and cream cheese and yogurt and margarine containers), cheese packaging (single slice and string cheese wrappers), energy bar wrappers, ink jet cartridges and cell phones.

PLAINFIELD — The Freedom Elementary School Parent Teacher Organization will host an electronics and TerraCycle recycling event from 1 to 4 p.m. Feb. 23 at the school, 11600 Heritage Meadows Drive.   The Freedom PTO will receive the current rate for aluminum cans and a flat rate for all other items depending on what is brought in. All proceeds will benefit the PTO’s Classroom Technology Purchase fund.   Community members may drop off household electronics.   Community members can also drop off items for TerraCycle, which makes consumer products from pre- and post-consumer materials.   Those items include candy wrappers, cheese wrappers and bags, chip bags, lunch kits, plastic cups, foil drink pouches, toothpaste tubes, toothbrushes and plastic toothbrush packaging, personal care/beauty products and household cleaners.

Last fall, The Daily Tar Heel’s editorial board wrote that Greeks, as an entire subset of UNCstudents, don’t recycle. This board mentioned the Greek Sustainability Council, but did not acknowledge its accomplishments/goals regarding sustainable living in the Greek community. The reporter claimed Greeks don’t recycle evidenced by cans littering some fraternities’ lawns. Although cans may sit around for longer than some homeowners would tolerate, this does not mean they are thrown in the trash. Recently, Pi Kappa Phi began recycling Solo cups, through a company called TerraCycle.

Do you know about TerraCycle? This company runs recycling collection programs for previously on-recyclable items, such as drink pouches, diaper packaging, candy and energy bar wrappers, dairy tubs, and household cleaner packaging. They recently added the ability to recycle cigarette waste. Much of the collected items are upcycled into new products that are sold on their website or through retailers they’ve partnered with, such as Target. Some is turned into pellets or other forms that then are converted into building materials. Recycling programs are organized into ‘Brigades’ by waste type. Some materials collections are done with partners such as Bear Naked and Athenos. Sign up for a Brigade online, create your own collection box, and start gathering your recyclables. Collection boxes at a place of work or at a school will help to collect items faster. Terracycle suggests creating a collection box that clearly indicates what you are looking for and placing the collection box in a well-trafficked location. Items don’t have to be cleaned or neatly stacked/packaged prior to donation, making the process simpler. Use odor-blocking plastic bags in your collection box to contain smells and liquid drips. Terracycle provides a collection and mailing guide on their website.

This cliché has translated into success for one young entrepreneur.  Tom Szaky is co-founder and CEO of TerraCycle, Inc., the leading player in “upcycling”, or turning disposable items into new products:  fertilizers from worm poop, backpacks from juice pouches and reusable tote bags from plastic bags. The company has been named the producer of the most eco-friendly brands in America. Szaky sees a new model for doing business in the future: eco-capitalism. Forget recycling and trying to reduce Americans’ consumption, he says. Instead, get rid of the idea of garbage and waste altogether. “The only reason waste is waste is because we haven’t figured out what to do with the material once we use it the first time. If you can find uses for waste, you can eliminate the idea of waste,” says Szaky.

Results for 2011-12 include: More than 75 unique media placements in CSR, environmental and business trade publications–more than 100 million media impressions; thought leadership through bylined blog posts and interviews; 13 conference presentations on the benefits of EPR; and three new 50% rPET products launched,  creating awareness of rPET and recycling in the Baltimore/Maryland and California markets, resulting in more than 56 million media and consumer activation impressions.—Scott Van Camp Honorable Mentions:

• City of San Diego - Water Purification Demonstration Project Outreach Program
• TerraCycle, Inc. - TerraCycle Brigade Program
• Universal Textile Technologies - Project Yellowstone

TerraCycle CEO Tom Szaky works in his office at the company's headquarters in Trenton, New Jersey, on January 10, 2013. TerraCycle Inc., a company devoted to creating recycling systems for hard-to-recycle waste, has created an alternative to leaving cigarette butts on roadways or putting them into landfills. Recycling entrepreneur Tom Szaky is stubbing out the world's cigarette problem—one butt at a time.

Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Co. (SFNTC) teams up with TerraCycle, a world leader in developing solutions for hard-to-recycle materials, to do something about cigarette butt litter. According to Keep America Beautiful (KAB), 65 percent of all cigarette butts are disposed of improperly. But thanks to another environmental breakthrough by TerraCycle, cigarette litter can now be recycled. With funding from SFNTC, TerraCycle is launching a national program to collect and recycle cigarette waste. The Cigarette Waste Brigade will divert used cigarette butts from landfills. By sponsoring this program, SFNTC is not only taking responsibility for the end-life of its products, but also for the products of its competitors.