By: Deborah Johnson Wood
Grand Rapids’ first-ever citywide electronics recycling event paid off big when a whopping 117,971 pounds e-waste was recycled instead of dumped in area landfills. That’s the equivalent of five semi-trailers of e-junk.
Local electronics recycler Comprenew Environmental organized the event as one of many local Earth Day (April 22) celebrations.
“It ended up being ‘Earth Week,’” says Lynell Shooks, Comprenew spokesperson. “We had nine organizations and employers participate around Grand Rapids that week. It was great to have that many open their places up to the public and to their employees to help the city be greener.”
People unloaded everything from mini recorders and old PDAs to a console television in a wooden cabinet.
“We got floor lamps, old PCs and monitors, shredders, de-humidifiers, and just enormous televisions,” she says. “It was like the march of the mighty televisions in our warehouse.”
Comprenew has a zero-landfill policy. Shooks says that 100 percent of the e-waste will be broken down by hand and recycled through places like Lake Odessa-based Franklin Metal Trading Corporation and Doe Run, a smelter in Missouri that receives the leaded glass.
Comprenew is already talking about next year’s event.
“The email going around this week was ‘What are we going to do for an encore?’”
Source: Lynell Shooks, Comprenew Environmental
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Deborah Johnson Wood is development news editor for Rapid Growth Media. She can be contacted at [email protected].
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