With the New Year starting, it is time to make some new traditions in your home. One thing that often gets over looked is the seasonal décor that you no longer plan on using. We will be taking down our Christmas tree this week, and that got me thinking: what do you do with your décor that is broken, inefficient, or unsafe? Should you throw them out in the trash? I know that I am not the only one with this issue either. Many families have switched to LED lights for holiday displays and have chosen to recycle older lights. Many of us also have strings of lights (I know I have 4 of them!) that no longer work.
Did you know that in many communities there is a way for both residents and businesses to recycle their holiday lights? In the Chicago area, both Cook and DuPage counties are working with Elgin Recycling Inc. to provide a seasonal recycling program for holiday lights and extension cords.
The programs in the Chicago area run through January in most towns (in Naperville, IL, their program will run through March). This gives residents time to remove and recycle lighting and cords that need replacement. Chicago has about a dozen drop off locations including City Hall, some police stations, and some community organization sites.
Now, garland, wreaths, live greens, and other non-recyclable material are not included in programs like these. However, most communities offer curbside pickup and mulching of Christmas trees and live greens.
Cities like Winnetka and Naperville (both in Illinois) contract for their holiday lighting displays and do not want those lights to end up in landfills. They actually write it into their contracts that their decoration contractor must recycle!
Elgin Recycling says that they take the materials to their main facility for recycling in Gilberts. Once there, the plastic and metals are separated, and then recycled. The plastics from those lights are now used in things like picnic tables. They also take the copper and melt them into ingots for further manufacturing.
Is this working? Well, Elgin Recycling will be the first to tell you that it isn’t a big money maker for them. (They provide the containers and transportation for materials and picks up all the costs). However, they want people to recycle. They want these types of items taken out of the waste stream. In places like Rolling Meadows, IL, the answer is yes, this is working! They collected 1,321 pounds of lights and cords last year!
If one of your New Year’s resolutions was to be more “green”, this is an easy way to do that. When you are putting away your holiday decorations, check them all out and see if you can donate too! Check with your local communities to see if they have some of these same recycling programs there, and make sure that you visit our Green Earth News Green Is Grand section for more eco-friendly lifestyle tips!
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We have a fake tree that came pre-lit. So, I don’t really think about getting rid of Christmas decorations. However, if I ever have to, I will definitely keep these tips in mind.
I have so many set of lights that don’t work. I refuse to throw them away because I’m on the verge of being a hoarder. So next year, I’ll look for a recycling center. Didn’t know they existed for this type of thing.
Great resource for your local peeps. I wonder if we have anything like this in Florida?
I’m an Illinois gal myself, and our community comes and chips the trees, but this is the first I’ve ever heard of a recycling program for the lights and cords. That’s awesome!
My tree is fake as well and I use my lights until they do not work anymore. Never knew there were recycling locations for them. Thanks for the info!
I too have a ton of lights I wish we had something like this in my area.
Good for Chicago for doing this! We certainly could use this program here in Nova Scotia. I actually use a fake tree and this year we didn’t even use lights on the tree.
I didn’t realize there were such places like this. I have to confess we did throw several away. Seems like each year we have to start over. I will have to look into something like this close to me.
Do you know how many Christmas trees I haul to the dump every year in my dumpsters? It has to be over 100, that is great that there is a way of recycling these to keep them out of the land dills and dumps.
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