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Serious question, has anyone else been called out for their recycling habits?
My partner pointed out last month that I was tossing greasy pizza boxes into the blue bin, which contaminates the whole batch, so now I always tear off the clean top lid for recycling and compost the oily bottom.
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the_claire28d ago
The New York Times had a piece last year about how wish-cycling, like putting in plastic bags or dirty containers, costs recycling plants a lot of money to sort out. They said it can jam up the machines for hours. Your pizza box method is exactly what they recommended doing.
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the_hugo27d ago
Ugh, wish-cycling is the worst. I saw a video where a plastic bag got wrapped around the sorting machine gears and they had to shut the whole line down. It's crazy that a little bit of grease on a pizza box or leftover food in a jar can mess up tons of good recycling. Makes you realize just tossing stuff in the bin can actually cause more harm than good. We gotta be more careful.
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williams.amy5d agoTop Commenter
Remember seeing a neighbor toss a greasy paper plate in the blue bin last week, @the_hugo. It's like people think the recycling fairy just magically fixes everything. That stuff just gums up the works and makes the whole batch useless.
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