What’s green and has lots of wires or circuits? The answer: your old electronics. Typically, we go through electronic devices and accessories at an unprecedented rate, and the cast-offs too frequently end up in the landfill. But recycling your unwanted electronics, accessories, and ink and toner cartridges is now easier than ever. This week’s links highlight some of the programs available.
Here’s an opportunity to keep used inkjet and toner cartridges out of the trash?and help local schools. Last year, Staples’s Recycle for Education program collected enough cartridges to provide $250 gift cards to over 2100 schools across the country (as well as a $50,000 cash prize to the school submitting the winning essay in its Computer Lab Makeover Contest). Talk about making the planet a better place for the kids!
Seeking a good ?home? for outdated computer monitors, old pagers, broken scanners, and the like? Ontario Electronic Stewardship (OES) has a province-wide collection program to ensure that these electronics don’t end up in a landfill. The program is funded by money that was collected from electronics manufacturers and importers when the products were first made or brought into the province. If You’re not an Ontario resident, be sure to check out the site’s links to resources for other provinces.
You know you desperately want that upgrade. So what to do with your old smart phone? There are a multitude of organizations that will take your old cellphones and phone-related paraphernalia off your hands, but It’s much simple to visit RecycleMyCell.ca to find the closest drop-off spot. And if there’s no convenient location near you, the organization?a project of the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association?will send you a postage-paid mailer.