Does Recycling of Plastic Material Really Work?

What happens to your ‘blue recycled trash’ materials? A common question regarding recycling is, ‘Does It Work’?

The answer is ‘YES’ it certainly works.

One of the most recycled plastic materials is HDPE. This is the material that laundry detergent bottles, milk jugs, opaque vitamin bottles and many more common household containers are made from. The HDPE is a FDA and NSF approved resin, and is the go to material for cutting boards, margarine containers, food storage containers, and many of your milky colored drinking cups.

So, what happens to these items after you put them into your recycle bin?

Your local recycling center sorts through your clean recyclables and segregates the materials by the type of plastic. HDPE has the recycle code of #2, and this can be found on the bottom of many of your plastic items. The other plastic items are sorted out based on the recycle number and type of material. This allows for better and more efficient reprocessing of these resins into new and re-purposed items.

The reprocessing of plastic scrap or discarded post consumer products generated a large quantity of plastic material. The HDPE recycling market is a fast growing area of the recycled plastic sector. The other common plastic that is recycled is PET, which has the code of #1, and this is the very clear water bottles and soda bottle material.

Once the discarded containers and other HDPE scraps are collected, they are sent to a recycle plant. This is where the containers are cleaned, sent to the grinder, and converted into small pieces that can be used in the manufacture of new products. This reprocessing of post consumer goods into a usable plastic lumber is the first step in the recycling process. Much later, after the very long life of the HDPE recycled lumber is over, it can be again reprocessed into another recycled HDPE product, maybe even another piece of HDPE plastic lumber. The cycle of using an already produced plastic product, and then reusing, recycling or re-purposing this material is as environmentally responsible as any consumer can be. This ‘closed loop’ recycling eliminates the use of other natural resources, and cuts the impact on our planet.

In a recent press release, HDPE recycled content from milk jugs, laundry detergent bottles, shampoo bottles and other post consumer content are gathered. Then it is ground to usable sizes, and then reprocessed into Recycled HDPE Plastic Lumber. The only additive are the colorant and a UV stabilizer or UV resistant additive. The material is sent threw an extruded or molding process, and the result is a plastic boards that look like real wood, but will out last any wood product by 5 – 10 times, and not require the maintenance that we know is required with wood lumber. The premium recycled HDPE plastic lumber, made by Bedford Technologies, has a 50 year warranty.

Plastic lumber does not rot, splinter, require paint or sealants annually, nor any other regular maintenance. Perhaps a semi-regular washing down is all that would be needed to have this material continue to look like new.

What are popular items that are made from this recycled HDPE plastic lumber? The limit to uses is only limited by your imagination. Some of the most common HDPE plastic lumber products are: outdoor decks, outdoor furniture, docks for lakes and marinas, trellises, walkways, playground components, parking bumpers, sign posts and many more. All of these items outperform the lumber products previous used for these applications.

Call us for more information on the available sizes and colors of recycles HDPE plastic lumber, 866-832-9315.