Where every day is Earth Day

Fifty-one 1,000-pound bales of compressed cardboard, nearly 25 tons, were loaded on a flat bed truck and headed for Springfield, Ore. on Thursday. The boxes of brand names, Cheez-it, Ziploc, Corona, will be recycled and sold to domestic and foreign markets.

"We're proud about what we and the community are doing," said Douglas Disposal Operations Manager Don Williams.

Williams was at the Douglas County Transfer Station showing off the 7-year-old recycling center and explaining the process of separating materials.

"A lot of people feel like they can't make a difference by driving up here and dropping of recyclables, but it translates into that," said Williams, pointing to a red 16-wheeler exiting the scales with the 51 cardboard bales stacked on its bed. "Everything separated goes to a market and is not thrown away. We're not going to waste people's time."

Williams said a lot of recyclable material is dumped with normal trash and can't be recovered once mixed with general refuse.

"We transferred about 169,000 pounds of trash a day last year," he said.

That translates into more than 60 million pounds of trash a year. In comparison, Douglas Disposal produced 1 million pounds of recycled material in 2007.

"If people can't afford to drive to the recycle center because of gas prices, they should see where they can go locally to drop off recyclables," Williams said.

Douglas County has seven recycle drop-off locations: the Douglas County Transfer Station, the Douglas County Animal Shelter, Holbrook Station, Smith's Food and Drug, Scarselli, Gardnerville and Jacks Valley elementary schools.

Locations differ in materials they can accept, but the recycle center at the transfer station, open 9 a.m. to noon and 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, takes aluminum, plastic, tin cans, corrugated cardboard, newspaper, magazines, office paper, automobile batteries and motor oil.

From 2 to 4 p.m. on Thursdays and 9 to 11 a.m. on Saturdays, the center takes hazardous waste material, including paints, stains, solvents, herbicides, pesticides, fertilizers, aerosol cans, contaminated oil and gas, household chemicals and cleaners.

The recycle center pays customers 27 cents a pound for aluminum.

"There's no money in any of the products except aluminum," said Williams. "Aluminum we sell pays for a lot of our operating costs, even though we only get about two to three truck loads a year."

Williams said an immense amount of human labor goes into the recycling process. Materials are transferred from recycling bins to the main transfer station where they're dumped into 17-foot pins, partitioned by concrete blocks, then further separated by hand.

"Even though it's a pain in the butt," said Jimmy Dew, a transfer station worker tasked with separating different types of plastic, "It's worth it to recycle. I want a place for my grandchildren."

After the materials are separated, they're fed into a baling machine and stacked in blocks, each bale weighing between 800 and 1,300 pounds depending on the material.

"In 2007, we produced about 30 flat bed loads of recycled material," said Williams. "We don't have a curb-side recycling program, but it's something we're looking at for the future."

Williams said he's been impressed with the community, whether it's volunteers offering to help, or businesses on the cutting-edge of green technology.

"It's very neat we have Bently Biofuels right here in the Valley," he said.

Not only does Douglas Disposal give its green waste (grass trimmings, tree limbs, etc.) to Bently for mulch production, but two months ago, it started using Bently's biodiesel fuel for its on-site vehicles: Caterpillars, back hoes and loaders.

"We're using B-20, which is 20 percent biodiesel and 80 percent standard," Williams said. "But it's been working great, and we're looking at using a higher percentage fuel in the future, anything to help reduce emissions."

Williams said Douglas County is a beautiful place to live and inspires a sense of environmental responsibility.

"There's no excuse for people dumping their stuff in the desert," he said. "We have fully functional recycling services that anyone can take advantage of. The world's resources are not unlimited. Taking our current resources and losing them in the ground forever is not the right thing to do."

Douglas Disposal is offering its spring clean up services May 26 to 30. Customers can leave up to an additional 1 cubic yard (6 to 8 32-gallon bags) of trash with their normal trash on regular pickup days, though appliances, tires, furniture, TVs and hazardous waste are not acceptable. Call 782-5713 for more information.