This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news, there is still a lot of failure. None of the 50 companies evaluated by shareholder advocacy group As You Sow earned higher than a B- on recycling, reusability or compostability goals, while long term concerns are mounting with heightened attention around “forever chemicals” at landfills and other facilities.

In other news, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality has released its annual report on solid waste management for the Commonwealth. Charlottesville’s CBS 19 relays the report, which says that the amount of solid waste Virginia facilities received in 2019 went up by more than 724,700 tons, or 3.3 percent, over 2018. Furthermore, the release says about three-quarters of the waste came from within the Commonwealth. The total amount from outside Virginia increased by 13 percent, with 43 percent of that coming from industrial sources.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news, Virginia has joined eight other states in pushing back on the U.S. EPA’s moves to relax environmental oversight due to the new coronavirus pandemic. Attorneys general for New York, California, Maryland, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Vermont, Oregon, and Virginia raised the issue in a brief sent June 8 to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. This is a good time to review the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the waste and recycling sector.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news…

Last April, Arlington County abandoned its curbside glass recycling program, saying separating and recycling glass had become overly expensive. Instead, residents were asked to drop off their glass recycling at dedicated bins that were then taken to Fairfax County for reuse in construction, building, and — more recently — recycling into new glass products.

Since the launch of the drop-off recycling program, county officials say 2 million pounds of glass have been recycled, half of which has been over the last few months.

“A million pounds since January was impressive, and we’ll likely see another million at a much faster pace for obvious reasons” as residents stay at home amid the pandemic, says Department of Environmental Services spokesman Peter Golkin. “Alcoholic beverage control (ABC) stores are definitely doing strong business, as are the grocery stores.”

Golkin said residents are asked to avoid late night or early morning drop-offs at the residential drop-off sites to avoid loud clattering.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news…

WTOP News reports that collections are under strain in all jurisdictions of Northern Virginia.

Many of those people have kept busy spring cleaning, and the result is bigger piles of trash and recyclables on the curb.

“Most of the jurisdictions are reporting a huge increase in trash and major waste generation from our households. Since stay-at-home orders were put in place, some have recorded 30% to 40% increases in the overall waste that is set out,” said environmental planner Debbie Spiliotopoulos, of the Northern Virginia Regional Commission. “It’s a huge burden on the waste collections systems.”

In other news, a Virginia Tech science team is helping make lithium-ion batteries more environmentally friendly. By reformulating the materials used for manufacturing lithium-ion batteries, researchers have come up with a way to process and recycle the batteries’ electrodes without using organic solvents. The advance could reduce the costs, hazards, and environmental impact of manufacturing and recycling these common power sources.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news, the website WasteDive.com recently ran a column covering COVID-19’s evolving impact on the waste and recycling sector.

Starting in mid-March, the Waste Dive team dedicated the majority of its time to covering what the rapidly evolving COVID-19 situation ​meant for waste and recycling in the United States. Frontline workers have been affected, services have been disrupted, policies have been temporarily changed and financial effects have been significant for the public and private sector alike.

Catch up on all of our reporting here, in reverse chronological order to present the newest stories first.

Locally, the Central Virginia Waste Management Authority has created their own news page in regard to the COVID-19 pandemic. Click here to see that.

Internationally, The Intercept had a very disturbing article entitled “AFRICA’S EXPLODING PLASTIC NIGHTMARE:As Africa Drowns in Garbage, the Plastics Business Keeps Booming.”

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

The Virginia Trekkers have created a video/podcast about the TFC Recycling Center in Chester, Virginia.

Recycling Today reports that the EPA is is now accepting applications for sustainable materials management grants to fund recycling markets or food waste reduction projects in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news, as with everything else, there are many concerns about the pandemic. From WasteDive.com: “Concerns persist about infection exposure while social distancing requirements are changing how collection routes and MRFs are operated. Labor unions are calling for answers around paid leave policies.” Thankfully, medical waste volumes from COVID-19 not as high as Ebola so far…also, per updated OSHA guidance, collection workers can treat all municipal waste and recycling with possible COVID-19 contamination with standard safety precautions that have been put in place to guard against broader contamination or infection issues.

This Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In local recycling news, Chesterfield County will, thankfully, continue to recycle. It’s government has decided to continue supporting the Central Virginia Waste Management Authority’s program of collecting paper, cardboard, glass and other recyclable items from residences for at least three more years.

Instead of pulling out, as the county had threatened last year because of rising costs, the Chesterfield Board of Supervisors voted instead to approve an increase in the yearly fee households pay for CVWMA’s curbside service.

U.S. News and World Report has an article on how Virginia as a whole is working to improve its glass recycling abilities.

And in local-international recycling news, a fragment of a Hampton,VA recycling bin was found washed ashore on a beach in Ireland this week, identifiable by its town seal printed in white.

Alright, I think the schedule was thrown off by President’s Day, but we now have the 2020 schedule, and this Wednesday is a “Red Wednesday”, which means trash and recycling pickup. Please go over what can be recycled. Ideally, rolling recycling containers are stored and deployed in the back alleys along with trash cans. Please make sure you pick up containers after pickup tomorrow night.

If you have not done so already, don’t forget to sign up for your Recycling Perks.
In order to take your recycling to the next level, read this: 10 ways to improve your recycling.

In recycling news, The NextGen Cup Consortium, an effort driven by McDonald’s and Starbucks, started reusable cup pilot programs at independent coffee shops around San Francisco and Palo Alto, California last week. The consortium is managed by Closed Loop Partners’ (CLP) Center for the Circular Economy, with the World Wildlife Fund serving as an advisory partner and design firm IDEO running the pilots.

It’s nice to see more sustainability efforts but everyone should be looking at corporate claims with a lot of skepticism. Greenpeace just released a report that includes a comprehensive United States survey of plastics recyclability. It found that U.S. companies are incorrectly labeling many plastic products as recyclable. The report, “Circular Claims Fall Flat”, states only PET #1 and HDPE #2 bottles and jugs are truly recyclable.

In more local news, this Saturday is the 6th Annual Shiver In The River, sponsored by Keep Virginia Beautiful. See more on that, but also more ‘about that’…