Clean and Dry Recyclables

At Kimble, we talk a lot about recycling right and the 3 easy steps. We work hard to remove contaminated material from the recycling stream so the end result is clean glass bottles/jugs, paper, cardboard, metal/aluminum cans and plastic bottles/jugs. Our goal is to give items a second life through recycling, however, what goes into your recycling cart has a big impact on whether the material can be recycled. 

Recyclable Guidelines

Making sure recyclables are clean and dry before putting them into your recycling cart is more important than you may think. Did you know leaving food or liquid residue on recyclable items can contaminate your entire recycling cart? For instance, jars with sauce or bottles with remaining liquid should go directly into the trash.

Cardboard also must be clean and dry. A common contaminant found in recycling carts is greasy pizza boxes. These also should go in the trash.   

As a general rule, if it’s not clean and dry, put it directly in the trash cart. Even if it’s an approved item, if you don’t have time to clean and dry it, it will do more harm than good to put it in the recycling cart. Throw it away! 

Tip: Triple rinsing your bottles, jugs and jars and then setting them out to dry helps ensure no contamination makes it into your Kimble recycling cart.

For more information on how to recycle right with Kimble, and for a full list of what we recycle, check out our Easy Recycling Guide.