Kayci has emailed:

First off, I absolutely love your website and all the nifty and creative ideas your community finds.

Now for a confession: I am a bookworm. I typically go through 100+ novels a year without breaking a sweat. In an effort to try and green up my hobbies I’ve stopped going to the used bookstore as often, as it is a twenty mile drive, and when I do go I always buy in bulk. I’ve also switched from Amazon to thriftbooks.com. They’re consistently cheaper, and they reward you for buying used books out of the same location.

My problem? Amazon always uses boxes, even if it was three or four of them per order. My new website sends my books in one large plastic bag (picture enclosed) that is numberless as far as recycling is concerned. The bags in question (I’ve amassed six so far) are 12×16 inches and have some minor holes from the shipping process. The texture of the bag isn’t conducive to making it into plarn, as it stretches out very easily. Any other ideas?

Hi fellow bookworm :)

The first thing you should do is email thriftbooks and explain your problem – they might not take action and change to cardboard (or similar) straightaway but the more people who complain about it, the more likely they are to change at some point — so join that chorus.

If they’re in good condition, and have been opened neatly with scissors, they can be reused for their original purpose – as a slightly smaller mailing sack next time you need to send something out. Unless you send a lot of things though, they may quickly mount up.

When we get those type of bags (and actually there is one on my desk right now that needs reusing!), we tend to use them as bin liners – obviously holey ones aren’t going to be good for small/wet rubbish but they’re fine in most circumstances.

That’s not terrible creative though – any other ideas?

Over on the Suggest an Item page, Emily asked:

Would anybody have any ideas for reusing the bags that stock feed comes in? They are some sort of plastic and not recycleable.

Funnily enough, I had this on my to-do list already as I’m starting to be overrun with the things too – and I’ve only got six small chickens, so I can’t imagine how many are generated by people with lots of animals/birds. (Mine are the heavy-duty flat plastic types – we’ve covered the woven plastic type ones before.)

The things I already do with mine:

• refill them with bedding & litter when cleaning out the coop. I bag it sometimes rather than tipping it all into the compost heap so I can give it to friends/family as fertiliser. Such a lovely gift! ;)
• use them to line the wooden planters I make. (I do this with some hesitation for fruit/veg containers as I don’t know what plastic it is so there may be some leaching issues.)
• use them as rubble sacks – they’re not quite as strong as actual rubble sacks but still pretty useful

I also know some people use them to “waterproof” ceilings of hen/duck houses, and I have a plan to build up the floor in our coop, and will cover it with these bags to make it easier to clean. Away from chicken stuff, I’ve seen people using opaque bags as weed barriers around trees.

Any other suggestions for ways to reuse them? Or any advice on recycling?

One thing I would say, as ever, is try to reduce your collection of them – look to see if there are any paper-bagged alternatives. If you’re storing the feed in a dry place, the paper getting damp shouldn’t be an issue. The heavy paper could be composted or recycled. Any other advice?

I’m possibly a bit late with this now (sorry Su!) but I just spotted this question and wondered if anyone had any advice/info/suggestions for further research.

Good friend of Recycle This and The Really Good Life Su asked:

Next week I am at a conference all week. One of the motions for discussion (which is supported) is about replacing union reps and H&S reps existing card cards with plastic credit card type. If this motion actually gets discussed (it probably won’t get prioritised) I intend to speak against the motion.

However, I need as much ‘ammunition’ as possible and wondered if anybody knew anything about the emissions released during manufacture, how long if ever, they take to degrade & anything else that might be relevant. Call this pre-emptive reducing!

I know that most credit cards are made from PVC which is hard to recycle, doesn’t readily breakdown and releases nasty chemicals if burned and during its manufacture – Greenpeace want PVC restricted/banned, as it already is in some European countries. It is possible (just a bit more expensive) to have credits cards made from PET (plastic code 1) — that’s a lot more widely recycled but still obviously uses resources in its manufacturing.

A bit of digging turned up this story from Slate magazine in 2009, which says about PVC cards:

It takes about 4.25 grams of petroleum to manufacture one 5-gram credit card. Multiply that by 1.6 billion — the number of credit, debit, and ATM cards produced in America in 2007 — and we’re looking at roughly 45,000 barrels of oil a year just to make the plastic that feeds our late-night eBay sprees. Granted, that’s a drop in the bucket compared with the 20 million barrels Americans consume daily. But those figures don’t include the billions of gift cards, loyalty cards, and store charge cards we stuff in our wallets each year.

And apparently:

In addition [to the petroleum], a variety of laminates, inks, dyes and other chemicals are used in their production.

Anyone else got anything else Su could use?

Granny Cain emailed about Ariel Gel Dosing Devices:

Enough!! I now have enough dosing devices for each child in a classroom…. but what to do with them? Tried poking a hole through the side, adding twine and making a bird feeder, but it kept flipping over. Needed some technical refinement… too much for my puddle brain. So folks please help me out!

I hadn’t heard about these dosing device but by the looks of it, they’re the new version of ye olde washing powder dosing balls but according to the only tiny picture I can find of them, more of a bowl than a ball, and apparently it “contain[s] an integrated soft plastic sphere”, whatever that means. (Is that right?)

Firstly, it’s obvious but since “reduce” is the most important thing to do, it’s worth repeating: really try not to collect any more. Liquid laundry detergent has a far bigger carbon footprint in packaging and transport costs – the gel is supposed to be a bit better on both accounts (and does promote itself on the idea that it can be used effectively at low (below 40C) temperatures) – but still.

As for the stash that’s already been collected, I’m struggling for ideas – either on how to make them into a bird feeder or anything else – since I’ve not actually seen one in the flesh — so over to you guys! Any reuse suggestions or recycling ideas?

We’ve had an email from Debbie:

Any ideas what we can do with individual microwave pudding pots from the supermarket? They’re plastic.

First up, as always, reduce if you can – I know those puddings are convenient but it doesn’t take that much longer to make your own with a microwave (for example, a syrup pudding only takes about five minutes from scratch and there are plenty of “chocolate pudding in a mug” recipes out there). Or, if there is more than one of you puddinging and you *have* to buy one, getting a bigger single pudding instead of lots of little ones – the overall amount of packaging will be slightly less, and the bigger pot will be more reusable.

Bringing us neatly onto reuses: any suggestions? I suspect there will be considerable overlap with yoghurt pots – but the ones I’ve seen are a little more shapely than those so that may allow other reuses.

The little ones are fine as seedling starter pots (make holes in the bottom for drainage), or as little paint pots. They’d make dome-shaped jelly moulds for individual jellies – or for making your own microwave puddings! You could also cross the plant pot/dessert mould ideas over and make dirt puddings ;) Any other ideas?

As for actual recycling, does anyone know what number plastic they are? From a bit of Googling around, I think they’ll be number 5, polypropylene – but I’ll check next time I’m at the supermarket.