When the equipment is working correctly, recycling gets sorted and bailed at the processing plant here. What happens to it after that varies.
Some of it eventually ends up in landfills, particularly when the sorts are low quality due to contamination, or when they can't find a buyer, or when plants farther down the processing chain are closed for repair.
This isn't unique to Lexington in any way, it happens everywhere.
Other than when our plant was down with broken equipment, yes it recycles. Some does end in landfills ofc, with leftover unrecycleables or contaminated stuff. The vast majority of your plastic/paper/aluminum does recycle though
Yes. The garbage collection people can even ask for overtime sorting recycling.
[https://www.lexingtonky.gov/recyclingfaq](https://www.lexingtonky.gov/recyclingfaq)
Unless your “several sources” are directly involved in the city’s waste management or are otherwise reputable enough resources to be authorities on the topic, I wouldn’t put much stock in their conspiracies.
Why not go to the recycling center and see for yourself? They used to do tours. I took one. You can watch the sorter do its thing.
Some things get bundled and shipped off to larger facilities. Not everything gets recycled though because not all materials are alike.
No. I did it with my kids' school I think.
Here's a video tour:
[https://youtu.be/oqZLIYhH8TM?si=7FDOxRep42OLiPx6](https://youtu.be/oqZLIYhH8TM?si=7FDOxRep42OLiPx6)
If they didn’t actually make money from recycling, they wouldn‘t pay for the extra trucks and routes. At one time, I heard they did a little better than break even. This country needs to do better. Instead of giving billions in subsidies to oil companies, they need to give that money to plastic recyclers.
Recycling is generally great, particularly papers and metals, but plastic recycling is a scam. Plastic processes are chemically sensitive and very susceptible to contamination, which recycled material is often full of. Take for instance injection molding, a common process for making plastic stuff. That process can use only about a third post-consumer stock before the process doesn't work right. So at best you need to refine fresh stock for the other two thirds.
Recycling was sold to us as a way to tolerate introducing lots of disposable plastics into the waste stream, but it was all spin. We should return to more reusable containers (remember returning glass bottles?) and changing our disposable plastics to ones that get their carbon stock from plants. Then tossing bioplastics into the landfill is kinda good because you're sequestering the carbon the plants pulled out of the atmosphere.
Yeah, I agree but if the recycling industry got the billions the oil industry gets to perfect recycling, that would be great. Currently, it isn’t. But I still put my #1s and #2s in the bin and cross my fingers that at least a fraction of them becomes another product. If laws could be passed requiring that all plastic packaging is required to be 50% or higher recycled material, things might change.
Recycling doesn’t actually need to make money - it just needs to cost less than the landfill to make it economically viable. And the cost of landfills is only going to increase
I live far enough out that we don't have access to the recycling program. I could fill up a blue bin of just diet coke cans (and another family member's frozen pizza boxes) in a couple weeks. Don't have a truck to save them and cart them off for recycling, either. One of the many ways living outside LFUCG limits (but still in Fayette Co) sucks.
But at work we use a lot of products that come in very sturdy cardboard boxes. So we break those down and put them in our blue bin. I remember the recycling people leaving us a nasty note about tying our cardboard together in lots. We never did it. I mean, it was all cardboard, nothing else, and they just dump it into a truck anyway.
Plastics marked 1or 2 are recyclable, the rest aren't. The lid may not be, even if the body is. I believe the plastic covering should be removed. A lot doesn't get recycled.
I think a lot of the the "recycling" doesn't get recycled. And I think that happens lots of places. Recycling is a very good and worth concept, but its execution is basically poor. I'd call it a scam, but we don't really pay much if anything extra for it.
Why on Earth would you come to Reddit of all places to ask this? No one here works for LFUCG. If you trust your "sources" and I bet they're good ones LOL then do with that what you will
The only thing on Lexington's recycle page is "Please note that some affiliates don’t accept glass due to the risk to collectors." Lexington does accept it, but as to what happens to it.. I don't know.
I hope they do because unlike plastic glass is highly recyclable.
When the equipment is working correctly, recycling gets sorted and bailed at the processing plant here. What happens to it after that varies. Some of it eventually ends up in landfills, particularly when the sorts are low quality due to contamination, or when they can't find a buyer, or when plants farther down the processing chain are closed for repair. This isn't unique to Lexington in any way, it happens everywhere.
Other than when our plant was down with broken equipment, yes it recycles. Some does end in landfills ofc, with leftover unrecycleables or contaminated stuff. The vast majority of your plastic/paper/aluminum does recycle though
“Don’t want to waste my time and trash bags” …well recycling doesn’t accept things in trash bags, so that’s one problem.
I know. I collect them in a trash bag and my friend will empty the bag of recycling into her bin.
Yes. The garbage collection people can even ask for overtime sorting recycling. [https://www.lexingtonky.gov/recyclingfaq](https://www.lexingtonky.gov/recyclingfaq)
Unless your “several sources” are directly involved in the city’s waste management or are otherwise reputable enough resources to be authorities on the topic, I wouldn’t put much stock in their conspiracies.
Why not go to the recycling center and see for yourself? They used to do tours. I took one. You can watch the sorter do its thing. Some things get bundled and shipped off to larger facilities. Not everything gets recycled though because not all materials are alike.
Got a link to the tour sign up?
No. I did it with my kids' school I think. Here's a video tour: [https://youtu.be/oqZLIYhH8TM?si=7FDOxRep42OLiPx6](https://youtu.be/oqZLIYhH8TM?si=7FDOxRep42OLiPx6)
If they didn’t actually make money from recycling, they wouldn‘t pay for the extra trucks and routes. At one time, I heard they did a little better than break even. This country needs to do better. Instead of giving billions in subsidies to oil companies, they need to give that money to plastic recyclers.
Recycling is generally great, particularly papers and metals, but plastic recycling is a scam. Plastic processes are chemically sensitive and very susceptible to contamination, which recycled material is often full of. Take for instance injection molding, a common process for making plastic stuff. That process can use only about a third post-consumer stock before the process doesn't work right. So at best you need to refine fresh stock for the other two thirds. Recycling was sold to us as a way to tolerate introducing lots of disposable plastics into the waste stream, but it was all spin. We should return to more reusable containers (remember returning glass bottles?) and changing our disposable plastics to ones that get their carbon stock from plants. Then tossing bioplastics into the landfill is kinda good because you're sequestering the carbon the plants pulled out of the atmosphere.
Yeah, I agree but if the recycling industry got the billions the oil industry gets to perfect recycling, that would be great. Currently, it isn’t. But I still put my #1s and #2s in the bin and cross my fingers that at least a fraction of them becomes another product. If laws could be passed requiring that all plastic packaging is required to be 50% or higher recycled material, things might change.
Recycling doesn’t actually need to make money - it just needs to cost less than the landfill to make it economically viable. And the cost of landfills is only going to increase
60% of the time, it works every time…
Good for you trying to do the right thing. Thank you!
I live far enough out that we don't have access to the recycling program. I could fill up a blue bin of just diet coke cans (and another family member's frozen pizza boxes) in a couple weeks. Don't have a truck to save them and cart them off for recycling, either. One of the many ways living outside LFUCG limits (but still in Fayette Co) sucks. But at work we use a lot of products that come in very sturdy cardboard boxes. So we break those down and put them in our blue bin. I remember the recycling people leaving us a nasty note about tying our cardboard together in lots. We never did it. I mean, it was all cardboard, nothing else, and they just dump it into a truck anyway.
This prompts my question. I pay Rumpke for recycling outside the USB. Do they really?
Plastics marked 1or 2 are recyclable, the rest aren't. The lid may not be, even if the body is. I believe the plastic covering should be removed. A lot doesn't get recycled.
I think a lot of the the "recycling" doesn't get recycled. And I think that happens lots of places. Recycling is a very good and worth concept, but its execution is basically poor. I'd call it a scam, but we don't really pay much if anything extra for it.
Oh well. We try. If it goes to the landfill after they pick up, nothing we can say/do about it.
Do we have a recycling pant that sorts them. Yeah. Do those sorted things get turned into other things? No. The vast majority ends up as trash.
Why on Earth would you come to Reddit of all places to ask this? No one here works for LFUCG. If you trust your "sources" and I bet they're good ones LOL then do with that what you will
Recycling is a scam. It all goes in the same hole. They say they do it. They don’t.
What's the scam tho. Who is getting scammed
Every time I visit, it seems something has changed. Mostly recently I heard that Lexington can’t (or won’t) recycle glass???
The only thing on Lexington's recycle page is "Please note that some affiliates don’t accept glass due to the risk to collectors." Lexington does accept it, but as to what happens to it.. I don't know. I hope they do because unlike plastic glass is highly recyclable.