While we strive for less waste to end up in landfills and teach our children the importance of reducing our waste by reusing, repurposing and reducing product usage, some things still need to be 'thrown out' but hopefully into the blue bin and not the garbage bin!
To find out what you can put in your Chestermere and Langdon blue bins, visit the City of Chestermere's website and get the Chestermere Recycles app or visit the Langdon Waste Collection webpage. The City of Chestermere's Eco Centre Recycle Depot accepts a wide range of items that can't go into your blue bin, including things like electronic waste, batteries, household hazardous waste and more. The Langdon Transfer Site also accepts items such as yard waste, tires and more.
You will see that not everything we'd like to stick in our blue boxes are accepted through the local recycling programs but did you know that in Canada there are national recycling programs like Terra Cycle that offers FREE shipping for some specific waste streams? Specifically of interest to me are the free recycling programs for some of the waste I accumulate with my children.
Terra Cycle partners with brands to accept the packaging and other waste that would normally end up in the landfill. All you have to do is request and download a free UPS shipping label to stick on the box you've packaged the waste into and ship it off to Terra Cycle for processing.
One tip to consider if you want to take part in one or more of these programs is to partner up with some friends and family to COMBINE your waste for one program so you can ship larger amounts and more frequently, so things don't pile up in your home and you also are more ecofriendly with fuel.
Some of the programs they have running with brands your children might use are:
- L.O.L. Surprise!™ Recycling Program
- Hasbro Toy Recycling Program
- Blocks and Bricks Recycling Program
- ZURU Bunch O Balloons™ Recycling Program (great to remember when you have the summer water balloon fights!)
- Snack Pouch Recycling Program
- Schneiders® Lunch Mate™ Recycling Program
- Terra® and Sensible Portions® Recycling Program
- Love Child Organics Recycling Program
Not to mention a bunch of household brands you might also use:
- Air and Home Care Recycling Program
- Babybel® Recycling Program
- Brita® Recycling Program
- Burt’s Bees® Recycle On Us
- Diva Recycling Program
- eos Recycling Program
- Febreze Aerosol Recycling Program
- Gillette® Razor Recycling Program
- Nespresso Capsule Recycling Program
- Oral Care Recycling Program
- P&G Eco-Box Recycling Program
- Royal Canin® Recycling Program
- Staples Recycling Program
- Sunlight® & Purex® Recycling Program
- Swiffer® Recycling Program
- Tom’s of Maine Natural Care Recycling Program
- Yves Veggie Cuisine® Recycling Program
- And much more online
I will definitely be collecting my kids' toy waste to send in for some of these programs and let friends know so that they can combine theirs with mine for shipments.
