Field of Science

Recycle plastic pots

A local green action organization is having a recycle everything you didn't think could be recycled day, and one of the things that can be recycled are plastic pots. The Phactor knew that if he saved them up long enough, in big stacked sets, they'd be good for something, or someone would get around to recycling them. Apparently plastic pots can be recycled into plastic landscape "timber"among other items. How appropriate. And that's good because you would like to think that gardening is a pretty green industry and there's all those plastic pots. A few plant providers have switched to pots composed of organic materials that just decompose, although some seem to take too long. More alternatives are needed. Now to load up the stacks and destroy the evidence of my plant buying problem. It's sort of like hiding those candy bar wrappers in the garbage. Actually it can be slightly embarrassing when recycling all the wine bottles too. It's not that so much wine is consumed, just that our recycling is done so infrequently.

1 comment:

Diane said...

I too have embarrassing accumulations of nursery pots and nowhere to recycle them. I am not sure that making them into "lumber" is a great solution as this is really downcycling and the end of the road for the plastic, like post-consumer polyester but it's the best use for now. I did get a couple of pepper plants this year in biodegradable pots but there wasn't enough information for me to trust them to my compost heap. Something like this, though, would be great although possibly not practical for perennials and shrubs grown for more than one season.