What Types of Plastic Products Can I Recycle?

What Plastic Products Can I Recycle?

Plastic recycling is recovering scrap or waste plastics and reprocessing the material into useful products. Compared to glass or metallic materials, plastic poses unique challenges – because of the massive number of types of plastic, they each carry a resin identification code. They must be sorted before they can be recycled. This can be costly – while metals can be sorted using electromagnets, no such ‘easy sorting’ capability exists for plastics. In addition, while labels do not need to be removed from bottles for recycling, lids are often made from a different kind of non-recyclable plastic.

Recycling statistics on plastic:

• Americans use 4 million plastic bottles every hour, but only 25% of plastic bottles are recycled
• Every year we make enough plastic film to shrink-wrap Texas
• Americans go through 25 billion plastic bottles every year.
• 26 recycled PET bottles equal a polyester suit. 5 recycled PET bottles make enough fiberfill to stuff a ski jacket.
• In 1988 we used 2 billion pounds of HDPE just to make bottles for household products. That’s about the weight of 90,000 Honda Civics.
• If every American household recycled just one out of every ten HDPE bottles, we’d keep 200 million pounds of plastic out of landfills yearly.
• Almost every hour, nearly 250,000 plastic bottles are dumped. It is not surprising that plastic bottles constitute close to 50% of recyclable waste in the dumps.
• The average time taken by plastic bottles to decompose in a landfill is close to 700 years.
• Plastic not only adds to landfill space and takes forever to decompose. Used plastic dumped into the sea kills and destroys sea life at an estimated 1,000,000 sea creatures yearly!

Plastic is a versatile synthetic material and has integrated itself into human usage over the years. We wrap our food in it, store items in it, drink from it and eat off it, have parties surrounded by plastic, and even wear it; of all this plastic, only 3 to 5 percent is recycled in America. Much of the rest of this plastic goes into landfills and takes 200 – 400 years to decompose.

Type 1 Plastic – Polyethylene Terephthalate (PET, PETE)
PET and PETE plastic can be recycled into carpet yarns, fiberfill, tote bags, food and drink containers, luggage, and clothing.

Type 2 Plastic – High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE)
Examples of recycling codes for HDPE plastic are seen below. The “PE-HD” symbol is often used by plastic bag industries.

Type 3 Plastic – Vinyl or Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)
Examples of PVC plastic recycling codes can be seen below.

Type 4 Plastic – Low-Density Polyethylene (LDPE)
Examples of LDPE plastic recycling codes can be seen below. The “PE-LD” recycling codes are often used by plastic bag manufacturers.

Type 5 Plastic – Polypropylene (PP)
The acronym PP (Polypropylene) refers to type 5 plastic. PP plastic is used extensively for packaging purposes. Given its high melting point and good chemical resistance, it is also used to contain hot-fill liquids and molded-in automotive parts. Examples of PP plastic recycling codes can be seen below.

Type 6 Plastic – Polystyrene (PS)
Examples of PS plastic recycling codes can be seen below.

Type 7 Plastic – Others

Examples of PS plastic recycling codes can be seen below.

Are all types of plastic recyclable?

The ease of recycling the various types of plastic differs.

• Type 1 plastic (PET and PETE) and Type 2 plastic (HDPE) are easy to recycle and poses a low risk of leaching breakdown products.
• Type 3 plastic (PVC) contains chlorine; hence, in its manufacture and disposal (e.g., incineration), highly dangerous and toxic gases are released. Hence, type 3 plastic is rarely recycled.
• Most American curbside recycling programs have historically not accepted type 4 plastic (LDPE). Nevertheless, more and more communities are starting to accept it these days.
• Type 5 plastic (PP) is also gradually becoming more accepted by recyclers.
• Type 6 plastic (PS), such as Styrofoam, leaches toxins and is very difficult to recycle.

Given the high cost of recycling, type 3 to 7 plastics are rarely recycled.

If you wish to make a difference to the environment, you should try to send your Type 1 and 2 plastics for recycling as much as possible. You should also try to reduce your consumption of Type 3 to 7 plastics, as toxins are usually released in their production, use, and disposal.