Who doesn’t want to be a steward of Mother Earth? For me, it’s hauling grass clippings to the town recycling center. Or, dutifully rinsing out soup cans and tossing them in recycling bins to lug out to the curb. Yup, I always do my part. TBH, it also feels pretty good to get all that crap off my hands and outta my house, too.

But what happens to all those cans, bottles and yard waste? Who cares, right? It’s out of sight, out of mind and on to the next bag of chips and Diet Coke—how’s that for an oxymoron? A lot of trash gets hauled to a recycling center nearby. To get an idea of just how much trash, I visited the Montgomery County Recycling Center as part of the Mid-Year Meeting of the Household and Commercial Products Association (HCPA).

HCPA set the tour up to give members an opportunity to learn about the benefits of recycling, understand why these facilities are important to the community and experience first-hand how recyclables are processed. The tour dovetailed with news that HCPA launched a can recycling initiative.

All good stuff, but the biggest thing I got out of the tour was just how much material is treated during a typical day and how little of it is truly recycled. It’s much worse than anyone will admit. In the US, for example, just 32.1% of municipal solid waste gets recycled, according to EPA estimates. Paper and paperboard account for nearly a quarter of MSW, with food a close second. What you won’t find? Beauty and home care products.

“We can’t compete on sustainability,” said beauty veteran Victor Casale, who ran MAC Cosmetics’ recycling program decades ago. “My role, because I was the operations guy, was to get it recycled. Fast-forward, and nothing really has happened.”

But things may be changing. Click here to learn more about packaging initiatives in the beauty industry. Click here to learn more about HCPA’s Aerosol Recycling Initiatives. On their own, they may be small steps, but at least we’re headed in the right direction.

Tom Branna
Editorial Director
[email protected]