Can That Be Recycled? New Instagram Hotline Can Help

Instagram doesn't have to be a waste of time. Beyond enriching your life with landscapes and other eye candy, it can help you figure out what can and can't be recycled. Recycling contamination is a big deal because it can mean that the stuff you've set aside for recycling at the curb goes into a landfill instead. Poland Spring has teamed up with The Recycling Partnership to help with consumer confusion.

Strange bedfellows, a Nestlé company that sells water in plastic bottles and a national nonprofit that helps foster recycling in communities and by corporate America? Let's see.

“Consumers play a critical role in reducing waste and improving markets for recyclable materials by recycling properly," Keefe Harrison, CEO of The Recycling Partnership, says in a news release. "Debunking common recycling myths empowers residents to do their part to recycle better, which improves their local recycling programs, helps create a healthier U.S. recycling system, and is good for the planet.”

The effort is an Instagram recycling hotline. People can get help by posting a photo of an item in question on their Instagram feed or in an Instagram story using the tags #NotTrash and @PolandSpringWtr. Then Poland Spring and The Recycling Partnership will get back to them with an answer.

This tube of garlic purée didn't make the cut, unfortunately. The campaign, launched Aug. 12, seems to be catching on slowly based on a search of Instagram posts. But the tags also are being used in Instagram stories, a company rep says, which don't show up in hashtag searches but are seen by the company that's tagged.

A Nestlé rep says the hotline is meant to address concerns and confusions voiced by customers about plastic bottles.

People are bound to be skeptical about the hotline effort, but it could help spur more recycling (and don't forget that stores also sell reusable water bottles that can be used over and over without confusion).

Poland Spring is donating $150,000 to The Recycling Partnership as part of the effort, airing a nationwide radio promotion and donating an additional dollar per properly tagged post to the partnership (up to $25,000).

People will continue to buy bottled water, this writer notes, but recycled plastic is better for the Earth than virgin plastic, according to The Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR).

Poland Spring says it already sells bottled water, made from PET plastic, that is 100% recyclable. It plans to convert all of its bottles to the material by 2022.

Some stats to round out this issue: About 29% of plastic bottles are recycled in the United States, or just 1,726 million pounds out of the 5,913 million pounds sold in 2017, according to a report from the National Association for PET Container Resources (NAPCOR) and APR. Also, less than half of recyclables in U.S. homes are recycled by consumers, The Recycling Partnership notes.

It will be interesting to see how this campaign unfolds.