Office Paper Recycling and Waste Paper Recycling
Eco-friendly Ideas for Office and Home Waste Disposal
Jan 5, 2009
Recycling waste paper and paper products is one of the simplest ways of reducing pressure on the planet. Here are a few household and office recycling ideas you can use straightaway, that can also save you money.
Office Paper Recycling: Plain and Window Envelopes
A little bit of care when opening envelopes goes a long way towards helping recycle them, saving money on stationery as well. Reuse blank window envelopes for casual correspondence that does not need to be branded. For normal envelopes, sticker labels can cover up the address area and enable reuse.
Office Paper Recycling: Documents
- One-side paper pads for rough use are a staple in any green office, and are extremely handy and money-saving. Explain to staff about waste paper recycling and get your them to deposit bad prints, extra copies or other waste documents and soon there will be enough recycle paper to generate several one-sided pads that can be cut to convenient size and stapled or stitched together, with even an attractive wrapper made of hand-made paper waste scrap.
- Confidential documents that cannot be used for one-side pads can be easily converted into shredded paper. Look for a paper shredding service in your area. Alternatively, you could do the shredding yourself and have one of the paper recycling companies in your area pick up your load on a regular basis.
Household Waste: Waste Paper Recycling
- One of the simplest and most interesting things you can do is to reuse invitations, hand made paper and other packaging material, boards, card, etc to make your own invitations, birthday and greeting cards, gift tags etc, as well as innovative packaging with the help of colours and ribbons.
- A whole lot of junk mailers can be used as one-side paper or even made into colourful strips for creative packaging and cards. Hand-made paper, specially, lends itself to a host of creative ideas, including writing pads, writing pad covers, gift tags, and more.
Household Waste: Recyclable Bags and Gift Wrapping from Newspapers
- Recycling bags is one of the major concerns of green activists, and newspaper bags make a great alternative to plastic carry bags. Newspaper bags are extremely strong and sturdy, and you can make your own by simply folding several sheets of newspaper together into a simple bag and pasting or stitching together one side. Jute or cotton string would make an eco-friendly strap as well.
- With some creativity and jazzing up, newspapers, in combination with brown paper, can also be used with colors and colored paper for gift-wrapping.
Recycling Cardboard
Packaging waste, especially cardboard, can be given to paper recycling companies. Cardboard cartons also make useful storage containers, especially for stuff that just needs to be put out of sight and does not need special care.
In spite of today's efforts at a paperless world, paper and board account for almost 80% of office and household waste. With just a little bit of effort and creativity, it is easy to recycle both, and to lighten your ecological footprint. You might also want to look at other recycling ideas.
Related Reading
If you found this useful, you might also want to read about recycling pcs in Go Green by Recycling PCs and Computer Monitors. You might also find more information on paper recycling useful.
