Does Your Business Recycle As Much As It Can?

The world is in a tricky state right now, and most businesses are coming to a standstill amidst the coronavirus pandemic. There’s a lot to worry about, but there have also been a couple of shining lights beaming through the darkness. Those of you that refresh news sites and Twitter all day will know that pollution is down remarkably in some of the countries put on lock-down during this virus. The skies cleared over China and Italy, and Venice actually attracted aquatic life with the canals running clear for the first time in decades. 

All of this proves that human beings are responsible for a lot of the pollution in this world. With that in mind, perhaps your business needs to revisit its sustainability policy. Are you doing all you can to minimize your carbon footprint? One quick way to answer this is by considering how much you recycle. Are you recycling enough? Could you do more? Take a look at the key areas of your business where recycling is possible to find out:

Paper & Packaging Materials

The bare minimum a business can do is recycle its paper and packaging materials. For starters, you should already cut down on your paper usage as it’s a waste of money in this day and age. This leaves you with hardly any in your business, and it’s so easy to recycle. You can do this yourself by re-using the same piece of paper over and over again for note-taking. Or, you can just put it in a recycling bin as paper is easy to recycle. 

The same goes for packaging materials like cardboard and some types of plastic. If you have orders delivered to your premises, then either repurpose the packaging materials or get them recycled. 

Pallets

Speaking of orders, what happens to all the items you send out for delivery? Most companies stack orders out on pallets to be distributed down the supply chain. Did you know that a high percentage of pallets end up getting discarded after just one use? It’s true, and yet this is an area where all businesses can do more by recycling the pallets. 

How does this work? For starters, most pallets are made out of materials that can be recycled at recycling plants. Or, if you work with an integrated pallet pickup business solution, you can give your pallets another life by putting them to use either in your supply chain or another business’s. The point is, you can definitely recycle more of the materials you use, lowering your carbon footprint.

Electronics

Modern companies rely on electronics for all kinds of business processes. But, what do you do with your items when they’ve come to the end of their life? You can’t sell them as they no longer work, so you probably throw them away. 

Don’t feel too bad for doing this – lots of people are unaware that many electronic devices can be recycled. You can sometimes find specific sections in your local recycling center to send your electronics to, or you need to contact the manufacturer directly, and they arrange for a pickup. Naturally, some parts of your devices can’t be recycled, but all of this is handled as they go through the recycling process. However, if you have old computers or printers, then don’t throw them away – recycle them. 

Food Waste

This is where the majority of businesses fall short. At home, you should have a recycling bin for biodegradable things. This mainly means the food that you don’t eat. It gets put in bags and recycled as compost for people to use when gardening or cultivating fields. At work, hardly anyone has these recycling bins set up. 

Think about all the food waste your company generates throughout the week. How many employees do you have? How much food do they bring into the office and end up wasting? If you have an on-site cafe, then the waste will be multiplied. Bring some food waste recycling bins into your premises, and you can start making more of a contribution to the global recycling efforts. 

Does your business recycle as much as it can? The chances are you can always do more. Take advantage of this slow period to try and reinvent your sustainability policy and create a greener business in the future. We’ve seen how easy and quickly the environment transforms when human beings aren’t polluting it. If every company did as much as they could to recycle and conserve energy, then we’d see clear skies and clear water far more often.