know your plastics!

Plastic items are marked with a resin id coding system (the number surrounded by arrows)

1. polyethyelene therephthalate (PETE)

2. high-density polyethylene (HDPE)

3. vinyl, polyvinyl chloride (PVC)

4. low-density polyethylene (LDPE)

5. ploypropylene (PP)

6. polystyrene (PS)

7. other (includes polycarbonate, acrylic, polylactic acid, fiberglass)

When it is neccesary to use plastic for food, the safest choices are: 1, 2, 4 and 5.

Preserve products accepts #5 plastics and recycles them into park benches, playground equipment and decks. Preserve Gimme 5 program

bottled water

After figuring in all the energy costs, from producing bottles to delivering them to market, the domestic (US) bottled water industry burns through an estimated 50 million barrels of oil per year.

The Container Recycling Institute estimates that in the US only 14% of empty plastic water bottles are recycled.

Reusing a disposable water bottle is not a safe reusing option. Re-use should be avoided because studies indicate they may leach DEHP—another probable human carcinogen—when they are in less-than-perfect condition.

#1 and #7 should never be reused!

Safer choices include bottles crafted from safer #2, #4 & #5. Aluminum bottles and stainless steel water bottles are also safe choices and can be reused repeatedly and eventually recycled.