Plastic Water Bottle Recycling Rate Increases

It has recently been announced by the International Bottled Water Association (IBWA) and the National Association for PET Container Resources that the national recycling rate of single-use PET bottles increased almost twenty percent in the last year.

In 2011, plastic water bottles had a thirty nine percent rate of being recycled in the United States. That was an increase from the 2011 recycling rate of thirty two percent. In 2011, five hundred million pounds of plastic water bottles were recycled from the nearly one and a half billion pounds that had been purchased.

It has also been noted that the overall weight of single-serve plastic bottles has dropped to just under ten grams meaning that less plastic is involved in the manufacturing. While these containers make up a very small sub-section of the overall waste stream produced in the United States (less than one third of one percent), representatives from the IBWA stress that all bottled water plastic containers are one hundred percent recyclable.

WasteCare Wants You to Remember: Does your business sell PET plastic beverages to customers or employees? Make sure you do your part of encouraging recycling by having separate bins to collect these. For ever water or drink bottle that ends up in the trash, that’s more you have to pay for waste disposal!