Do not put these in the recycling cart. Put in the garbage if you have no other options.
Most people know expanded polystyrene as Styrofoam®. The name Styrofoam® is actually the trade name of a polystyrene foam product used for housing insulation.
It has gained a notoriously bad environmental reputation because very few recycling programs accept it and it can sit in a landfill for centuries.
The best solution is to avoid Styrofoam altogether in favor of more earth-friendly materials. These products are not always accepted for recycling.
However, there are some recyclers who accept polystyrene products. You should put your polystyrene foam (Styrofoam) in clear or white plastic bags before bringing it to the Transfer Station drop off sites. You can break up larger pieces of material to get it to fit in the bag. (You may use plastic grocery bags.).
Unfortunately. there are limited options for polystyrene foam products such as:
- Meat trays,
- Disposable foam cups and plates,
- And the expanded polystyrene that your electronics are packed in.
But there are some reuse ideas to keep them out of landfill:
- Polystyrene foam cups and takeout containers can in theory be washed and reused, but as we know, in practice seldom are ever reused.
- If you have a lot of polystyrene foam make your own packing peanuts – just cut it up into smaller pieces and use it as packing materials.
- You can add drainage for your plants with packing peanuts or by cutting up large pieces of polystyrene foam. Add them to the bottom of the pot instead of rocks, fill with dirt and add a plant.
Foam products are a problem for many recycling programs, because these products tend to fall out of the process because they are either small (e.g. packing peanuts), flatten out (e.g. foam take out containers and cups) or fly off the assembly line due to their lightweight nature (e.g. foam packaging). There are a limited number of outlets for recycling expanded polystyrene foam,because the costs associated with moving a very lightweight material to one of these markets is often greater than the value received for the material.
Foam packaging has come a long way in the last few decades. Where foams used to contain chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), a potent greenhouse gas which contributes to climate change, they no longer contain these materials. Foam is also a very, very small portion of the waste stream by weight, so recyclers focus more on collecting recyclables such as paper or cardboard, which have a much greater positive effect on local recycling programs.
