Interesting Facts about Recycling Plastic and Glass Bottles

Over the last few decades we have become a society that throws everything away. If we didn't learn to change the way we think about our environment, we would one day use up the natural resources and our grandchildren's children would live in a far different world than we do now. Recycling plastic and glass bottles is the best way to keep a healthy environment.

Recycling plastic and glass bottles has to be done separately. You need bins for your glass bottles. You'll need a bin for your clear bottles and jars, and you'll need bins for colored bottles. Plastic bottles have to be separated also, because of their chemical composition. Plastics are a kind of polymer, and there are different kinds of polymers. Some polymers are thermoplastic; those can be heated and reheated over and over to be shaped into a product. Their chemical composition is such that the chemical chain stays intact and can flow with the melting. Another kind of plastic is a thermoset polymer, which does not keep its shape when melted. It's chemical composition is such that the molecules permanently lose their shape when heated.

Plastics are categorized by number for the chemical composition. The number only identifies the class of resin used in the making of the plastic. Recycling plastic and glass bottles isn't so hard if you know what you are doing. If you have questions about what to do and what not to do when recycling plastic and glass bottles call the Department of Public Works in your county.

It is important when recycling plastic and glass bottles to wash or rinse them out before placing them in your recycling bins. Plastic bottles that have a numbers 1 and 2 inside the chasing arrows will be picked up at your curb, if you have a municipal recycling center. These types of plastic containers are your milk and beverage containers, as well as vegetable oil and detergent containers. Other kinds of plastics, such as the plastic grocery bags can be returned to the stores where they will be recycled. As you go into the store there are large collection bins for you to deposit your old grocery bags. These kinds of plastics cannot go out to the curb to be picked up by the recycling truck. People that work in the recycling centers are responsible for recycling plastic and glass bottles. They have to sort the recyclates to make sure that plastic is not mixed in with the glass and the glass is not mixed into the plastic recyclates.

An interesting fact about recycling plastic and glass bottles is that recycled plastics don't get made into new plastic bottles, but are made into other things like textiles and toys, while glass can be broken down into cullet and made into glass bottles over and over again, because glass does not lose any of its properties.