You can either be part of the solution or part the polluter – read here!

According to US Government statistics, an average household produces 20 pounds hazardous waste every year. When we blame the “big businesses”, it’s not the truth. We could add more to an average neighborhood than that. We didn’t do it because of a lack of concern, I’d guess, rather because we weren’t aware that the items we use every day are hazardous.

We would probably not call our regular trash hazardous, but if we throw household batteries and lightbulbs in the garbage, then you have added chemicals to the toxic waste “brew”, which is leaching out into soils, ultimately entering our water.

The following is a listing of hazardous substances:

Use old motor oils, oil-based paints (including paint thinners), herbicides incesticides pesticides pool chemicals household cleaning products batteries mercury drain cleaners lawn chemicals Solvents antifreeze hobby chemicals aerosols paints CFL Florescent light containing mercury Note: this includes the containers.

This is what you can do:

Do not pour solvents, cleaners, or old batteries down the sink or in our water. Ask your municipality if it has a facility for disposing of hazardous items. This is something that one Fire Station in my neighborhood does every weekend.

The way you handle electronics will be different. Is there a local electronics collection day every year? Find out from your local authorities what day to reserve so that you can get rid of your old VCR’s TV’s printers computers etc. All of these items shouldn’t be placed in your regular trash collection. These items are collected by local authorities so that the waste can be disposed off properly.