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City Of Austin Expanding Recycling Program


Austin Resource Recovery announced they will expand its recycling program Thursday to add some aluminum materials.

“We are adding aluminum baking tins and aluminum baking pies and we’re adding aluminum foil,” said Austin Resource Recovery director Bob Gedert.

Each household has a bundled service, which includes trash, recycling and trimmings, but Gedert says their blue recycling bins are being underutilized.

“We are averaging about 25 pounds per household of recyclables per collection day. We really should be around 30 to 32 pounds per household,” said Gedert.

With more items like aluminum foil being added to the list, Gedert hopes this encourages people to reduce their landfill intake.

The good news? It’s no extra cost to customers.

“We pay for processing costs, but we receive a market revenue of the material which offsets our cost,” said Gedert.

As for how much the city makes off of each recycle depends on the market value. From that the city receives a percentage so your cost does not increase.

“Things go up all the time so that's great,” said customer Angela Wallace.

Wallace couldn’t be happier about the extra material being added for nothing. “I like to recycle things. It helps the environment,” said Wallace.

She’s been recycling for years and wants the program to expand further. “I think it would be great to have Styrofoam and Christmas paper,” said Wallace.

Every year the city plans to add a new material that will help Austin reduce its carbon footprint and reduce 90 percent of waste by 2040.

City customers should be receiving a calendar in the mail next week, which will tell you what day your recyclables are picked up and have a list of what you can recycle.

By Christie Post