Acceptable Materials

Newspaper

Acceptable Items:

• Newsprint including glossy inserts
• Magazines
• Catalogs
• Phonebooks, soft covered books

Special Note: No Wrapping Paper

Did you know?

• On average 100 pounds of newspaper is generated per person per year.
• 28% of the fiber in newspapers is from old newspaper.

Cardboard

Acceptable Items:

• Cardboard
• Boxboard
• Brown paper bag

Examples: Cereal, crackers, pasta, toothpaste boxes, and shipping boxes

Special note: No wax coated produce boxes, pizza boxes, or refrigerated/frozen food boxes

• Recycled cardboard only takes 75% of the energy needed to make new cardboard and lessens the emission of sulfur dioxide that is produced when making pulp from trees.
• Recycling 1 ton of cardboard saves 9 cubic yards of landfill space and 46 gallons of oil.

Office Paper

Acceptable Items:

• White and color paper
• Shredded paper

Examples: Mail, office and school papers, envelopes, sticky notes, and card stock. File folders and note books.

Special note: Remove envelope windows. No need to remove tape, staples or metal spirals.

• Each year in the U.S. we throw away enough office paper to build a wall 12 feet high from Los Angeles to New York
• Recycling 1 ton of office paper saves 17 trees and 7,000 gallons of water.

Metals

Acceptable Items:

• Tin
• Aluminum
• Scrap Metal

Food grade and small non-food grade metals.  Food grade metals will go in with the plastics and clear glass.  The non-food grade metals are placed in a separate container located to the north side of the office – please inquire at the office.  As of May 2021 we can no long accept any size propane tanks, please refer to Fair Salvage 989-386-7552 to see if they accept propane tanks.

Examples:        Canned food containers, aluminum beverage cans, aluminum foil and pie plates, empty aerosol cans. Ferrous and Non-ferrous metals including lawn furniture, hangers, pots and pans, shelving, and wire.

Special note: All scrap metal must be dropped off at the Recycling Center. Scrap metal is not recycled curbside or at the depot locations.  Please call prior to drop-off to ensure the item will be accepted.  As of May 2021, we can no long accept Propane tanks of any size.  Please refer to Fair Salvage 989-386-7552 to see if they accept propane tanks.

No Appliances – please take directly to Fairs Salvage Company 2731 E. Grass Lake Rd, Clare MI 48617 – call first to see if they accept or what you need to do to prepare (remove antifreeze) for them to accept item.  989-386-7552.

Points of Interest:

• Energy saved from recycling one ton of aluminum is equal to the amount of electricity the average home uses over 10 years.
• Recycling steel and tin cans saves 74% of the energy used to produce them.

Glass

Acceptable Items:

• Clear glass only bottles and jars

Special note: No need to remove labels, rinse lightly. No plate or window glass, no other colors, no Pyrex®.

• A recycled glass container can go from a recycling bin to a store shelf in as little as 30 days.
• Glass can be recycled forever and glass containers are made up of as much as 70% recycled glass.

Automotive

Acceptable Items:

• Motor oil (25¢ per gallon)
• Antifreeze (25¢ per gallon)
• Oil filters (25¢ each)

Special note: These items can be recycled only at the ICMRF, they cannot be accepted curbside or at any of the other depots located in Isabella County.

• Just 1 gallon of motor oil can contaminate 1 million gallons of freshwater.
• Oil can be reused and recycled through reconditioning, reprocessing, and re-refining.

Yard Waste & Brush

Acceptable Items:

• • Brush: $12 per cubic yard
  • $6 per 1/2 Yard
  • $3 per 1/4 Yard
  • $1 per 33 Gallon Bag
  • A Standard Truck Bed 4′ x 8′, level with the bed of the truck $15.
  • 3/4 truck bed 4’x 6.5′, level with the bed of the truck $12
• Leaves and grass: $1 per 33 gallon bag
• X-mas Trees: 7′ or less $3; 7′ or more starts to increase by $3.

Special note: All yard waste bags must be emptied; take plastic bags with you, brown paper bags may be recycled in the cardboard bin.

• Yard waste can be composted at home along with food scraps to produce a natural soil amendment.
• Grasscycling, leaving the clipping on the lawn, reduces the lawn’s water loss and need for fertilizer.