Up-cycling is the new Re-cycling

 We all know about recycling the basics; paper, aluminum cans and glass bottles, but what about chip bags, tires, or old pens? Although those do not normally fall into the day-to-day recyclable category, Yale’s Recycling Office now makes it easier for you to go beyond the basics of recycling with Up-Cycling!

What is Up-Cycling? While re-cycling processes used products to reconstruct them into something new, up-cycling transforms old products into something completely new.

The Office of Recycling has partnered with Terracycle, a company that collects used items that might ordinarily be landfilled - candy wrappers, chip bags, writing instruments - and makes them into new products like backpacks and trash cans. With more than 20 million people collecting waste in over 20 countries, TerraCycle has diverted billions of units of waste and created over 1,500 different products. You can find these products at stores like Wal-Mart, Whole Foods, and Home Depot.

Yale’s first Up-Cycling initiative will be to collect writing instruments as a member of Terracycle’s “Writing Instrument Brigade.” The Recycling Office offers special “Pen Pails,” or collection bins, to offices around campus where you will be able to drop any defunct writing implement, from a Sharpie marker to a ballpoint pen. Pick up of collected bins is as easy as emailing the recycling offce.  For every writing implement Yale collects, Terracycle donates two cents to The United Way of Greater New Haven, making the endeavor an all around win. In 2011, for example, TerraCycle donated over $3 million to various charities. Yale diverts its waste stream, spends nothing, and earns money for a great cause.

To request a bin or to have your writing utensils collected, please contact the Yale RECYCLING Office through Central Customer Service Center at 432-6888 or by emailing centralcsc@yale.edu. FAMIS users may also submit a request through that system.