Frederick County (MD) Division of Solid Waste and Recycling

Hey Neighbors, we know you're excited about the grand opening of a particular fast food restaurant. Now, all you need is a Trader Joe's to finish your Frederick County "I'll be Happy When We Get A____" Bingo card. How exciting?!

In this excitement, remember to trash or compost any greasy boxes and paper trays, wax papers, paper bags, and food waste that might be left over from your joyous feasts.

Feel free to send us pictures, but don't send any of those above items in your blue bin; it's considered contamination, and we won't enjoy it as much as we enjoy the 30-part story you put up.

We get asked A LOT about how to introduce the next generation to Trash, Recycling, and other choices that fall under the term "Integrated Waste Management."

While ideally, the young person in your life should have their CDL and be driving a trash or recycle truck by 10, Solving the Thermoset Plastic problem around 9, be fully in shape to drag the recycling cart to the curb by 6, and have a master sorter by 4, and have their first words be "That's not recyclable," in truth, only YOUR good habits actually matter.

While we go into schools and have age-appropriate curriculums and presentations, only YOU and YOUR examples truly reinforce those lessons that we and hard-working educators give.

And the best part is that those habits will present themselves very early on, even as early as that 2 to 4 range.

Something to think about...

And if you need help with your habits, remember we're here for you; there's Recycle Coach and our website to give you the tools you need to be successful.

This is one of those good news/bad news posts.

The Good News: Tetra Paks, which is a carton-style material, is 100% recyclable in Frederick County. Many juice boxes, shelf-stable broths, stocks, and milks fall into this category. So feel free to recycle these, empty, with the lids on and without alteration.

The Bad News: Over the weekend, our pack of Tetras escaped; they could be anywhere, so if you've seen this pack of Tetras roaming around Frederick County, know they are friendly, and they should respond to "Bottle, Jar, Jug, Tub, and Gupli the Tetra Warrior." We hope they are ok.

Ever heard of the Mandella effect? It's a theory that things as we remember them actually didn't exist that way...Take, for instance, the Disney classic "The Lion King"...

You might remember Mufasa teaching a young Simba about the circle of life...WHEN ACTUALLY, Mufasa was teaching young Simba how non-soluble waste you flush, like wipes, can raise costs by breaking machinery, needing to be sorted, then landfilled.

This circle of solid waste isn't often talked about, but yes, anything flushed or dumped into our county's sewer system over two inches ends up being landfilled. And while we're joking about the Mandella effect part, we're not kidding about the impacts you can have by making sure you take control over your waste choices, whether that's trash, recycling, or even what you flush.

Also...Happy Monday, right?

Please don't crush cans on your head this weekend. You're not in college anymore, and those cans are infinitely recyclable, but your brain isn't.

🎶 Loud Guitar Riff 🎶

Frederick County....Are.You.Ready....To...ROT?!
We're ready! A week from today, as the GOAT, The Great Frederick Fair, opens the gates, we'll be set up all week at the City Streets and Country Roads Pavilion, talking about how letting things rot...ROCKS!

Learn more about the county's yard waste and compost program, as well as about backyard composting and other types of composting available to you and your family!

Be prepared for the freshest-smelling display about rotting you've ever seen! (Well smelled, seen, and hopefully heard, you know what, bring all the senses you can.)

We can't wait!!

There you are, sitting on your dining room table, looking into the eyes of your high school crush, and they whisper, "Thanks for coming over. " To which you reply, "Thanks for coming to get me." To which they reply, "I just put an entire coffee maker in my blue bin...make a wish."

Do you:
A.) Whisper: "But it already came true."
B.) Tell them about the dangers of wishcycling.
C..) Leave.

If you answered B. and C., you're 100% correct. Wishcycling gets you nowhere, and it can really kill the mood in what may be quite a romantic situation. So save your wishes for the Candles, and don't ruin the mood by making great recycling choices.

Find out what we accept into our program by asking questions, visiting our website, or downloading Recycle Coach. Remember, if you're ever in doubt, throw it out.

There's support for you and your high school crush here in Frederick County, so you can save those wishes.

Hungry? Lazy? Recycler? Craving Peanut Butter sauce? Well, we have a legumecellent recipe for you!! Especially if you want to use that last little bit of peanut butter in the peanut butter jar before you send it to the big MRF in the suburbs of Baltimore.

Step 1: Garlic, Ginger, All Spice, Soy Sauce (2 Tablespoons), Rice Wine Vinegar (1 Tablespoon), Fish Sauce (Optional, 2 teaspoons) Love (Not Optional), put it all together. (You can put in a little warm water, too, if it's too thick)
Step 2: Cap that jar and shake until smooth!
Step 3: Pour over ice cream. (Just kidding! We're making sure you're still reading.) Actually, pour over chicken or noodles or even rice or quinoa. You can't go wrong!!

Of course, if you have allergies, this sauce isn't worth getting sick over, so make substitutions as needed!!!

And to be honest, you can add spice to this sauce, add depth of flavor and texture with some chopped-up peanuts or green onions, and an almost empty peanut butter jar is your oyster for a quick and easy dinner dish!

We're right in the middle of our Labor Day slide. Two things to remember:

1.) If your recycling collection is this week, all collection slides one day because of the holiday.
Wednesday--> Thursday
Thursday --> Friday
Friday --> Saturday.

2.) The perfect slide snack is cubed cheese, but to be fair, it's good at any time-just in moderation.

Repeat after us..."I (State your name) will do my best not to buy something from a billion-dollar corporation and think I can use it because they told me I could."

Thank You...

Save your money; your recycling should be loose in the bin. Products like this get us worked up, like unreasonably so, to the point that we need to call Sven our Anger Management Life Coach...And we're not sure Sven actually went to the "Callahan Institute of Centeredness and Haberdashery." so we're suspect of him, and suspect of these types of products from some really big names...So let's do this together; you avoid products that encourage the bagging of recycling, which allows us to avoid Sven.

Neighbors, please make sure we don't commit any fashion faux pas by making us wear white after Labor Day. We are blue year-round; it's steady, confident, and conveys our entire vibe. So please don't paint your blue bin, don't spray paint your address on it, and while it may be cute, don't draw little faces on your blue bin.

If you want to help your bin stand out from the rest, put special color tape underneath the lid of your blue bin. Make a fun design or a boring design—just make sure it's not permanent! You can also put address stickers on your blue bin, but again, nothing permanent!

If you have any questions about how to make your blue bin stand out but stay in style, give us a call or message us! We'll be happy to help!

To quote Aerosmith... "Living on the edge. Living on the edge. Living on the edge. Living on the edge."

Do we throw this takeout container-turned lemonade cup into the trash or save it for our blue bin of rocking recycling? It's time to examine this material closely to see where it belongs.

First, is it empty?
❌ Nope, these lemons need to find a home! They should go into the compost, trash, or in the mouth of someone who just swore.
❌It also has a plastic straw; straws are not recyclable and need to be trashed.

Is it a plastic bottle, jar, jug or tub?
✅ Yes, it is a tub; it fits the definition of a tub with a flat bottom and sides. While maybe it was turned into a lemonade container with crunchy ice, and we sipped it once, and then again indeed sipped it twice, it's still a tub.

Is this product microwave-safe?
🫣 Unfortunately, yes, it is. When an item is microwavable or "Microwave Safe," it tells us that the plastic contains additives that have limited markets and are not accepted in our program here in Frederick County. The tubs we do accept are not microwave-safe. To check if a material is, most have a special icon or say so on the bottom and are indefinable.

So, based on the information above...Will we accept this as part of the blue bin program?
❌ No, these takeout container-type tubs are not accepted. Along with the reasons above, we lump these with other takeout containers. The frustrating thing here is that this material does hold value, and maybe you should think twice before throwing it away. Reusing this container is a solid option, especially for your "The Bear" Halloween-themed costumes, but just in general for organization and your own leftovers.

With fair and festival season underway, you might see drinks presented to you like this. Go into the purchase thinking reuse or the garbage as your options when it comes to that last sip!

Labor Day might symbolically be the end of summer, but it's literally a day of rest for our contractors and crews who work so hard, day in, day out, no matter how hot, cold, stormy, or calm, they do their jobs...

All DSWR Facilities will be closed today, with normal operations beginning at 7AM tomorrow.

Due to this closure, we are on a holiday slide with our curbside recycling collection. Today's scheduled collection will slide to Tomorrow, Wednesday to Thursday, Thursday to Friday, and Friday to Saturday.

Download Recycle Coach for further reminders and updates!

Not putting plastic bags in your recycle bin. Very prim, very respectful...We didn't do this right did we?

First...Are you ok? Second, so many in our area were impacted last night and we are grateful that this morning, so much has already been cleared. However, roads may remain closed or impassable in some places as clean-up continues.

If your road is temporarily blocked or closed, our crews will make two attempts to collect on that road. Once those attempts are made, our contractors will log the closure with us, and that road will not be collected.

If this happens, we encourage you to bring your recycling to our Recycle Center off of Reichs Ford Road or wait until the next recycling collection and put extra recycling out then.

We aren't seeing much disruption (Although we heard a bear was kind of spicy in Thurmont last night) so far during today's collection, but please let us know if you have any questions. We're here to support you!

Next week will be our Labor Day Slide. No need to get super meta about it, but if your collection is next week, please note the schedule change due to our Reichs Ford Road facility being closed on Monday September 2nd:

Monday --> Tuesday
Tuesday --> Wednesday
Wednesday --> Thursday
Thursday --> Friday
Friday --> Saturday

Downloading Recycle Coach will also be helpful, as you'll receive alerts and stay updated about this and future collection slides!

We all love going on trips. We've gotten into a car with no destination in mind a time or two, which explains our 2-star Uber rating, but there's one trip you should avoid when recycling—a guilt trip.

Yes, guilt is really easy to feel when you're a recycler, especially when you try to follow the rules. Then, one day, BOOM, you find a bright orange tag on your bin, or you read this page and realize something you've been putting in for years has been taken, but in truth, it has been thrown away down the road.

We won't tell you how to feel, but maybe give yourself a little grace because mistakes happen. We all make mistakes, and truthfully, the people who support you in your recycling journey make mistakes, too. All we ask is that when you learn something, you take that knowledge and do your best to change habits, and sometimes, that takes some time and reinforcement.

Take advantage of Recycle Coach, our website, and this page to ask questions and build knowledge that will send you on the path of learning rather than guilt.

And if you happen to be taking an Uber on that path, can we split that ride? Yeah, that 2-star rating has really come back to bite us.

How did we do?

Last night, we got together with some of our other waste-related pages and had our 2024 Recycling Fantasy Draft.

Our team, "Wasting Away Again in Fredericktowne," had the first pick, so we went with water bottles. As 35 billion are recycled annually, this is a no-brainer pick.

For our next two rounds, we went with Cereal Boxes and Soup Cans, followed by Envelopes, Butter Tubs, Milk Cartons, and our sleeper pick: Olive Oil glass bottles.

We think we had a strong draft, and the best part is that all of these items can be recycled in our blue bin here in Frederick County! Well, except for the Cowboys, they can go right into the trash.

It's time for another Recycling Movie Review. Where we'll look at movies named after recyclable materials and see if they're really about recycling.

Today, 2019's "Glass. "As we know, our blue bin recycling program accepts glass bottles and jars. However, the twist in this movie is that Glass isn't about recycling at all!

Shocked? Well, if you know anything about M. Night Shyamalan's other work you probably aren't. Especially when you realize this is part of a trilogy of movies that include the titles "Unbreakable" and "Split." These movies we thought were about plastics and textiles, but, alas, they are a conversation on the vulnerabilities of ourselves, our ego, and how we mask those vulnerabilities from this world.

"Glass" gets a 0 out of 5 Blue Bins for not being about recycling.

However, "Glass" gets 3 out of 5 Spaghetti Sauce Jars for a serviceable end to this trilogy. Or is it?

We could (and did write) at least 300 refrigerator puns, jokes, and pop culture references, but this isn't funny. Today, one of our inspectors spotted this refrigerator dumped in an area with some new construction.

What is frustrating is that the county offers FREE disposal of items like refrigerators, dishwashers, dehumidifiers, freezers, etc., even if they have freon in them.
These items can be disposed of Monday through Saturday from 7 AM to 4:30 PM at our Recycling Center off Reichs Ford Road.

Again, for Free-ze.

Ok, just one, but yes, it's still serious.

Remember those "Magic Eye" optical illusions, where you put your nose really close and then moved back slowly to reveal a bird, a message, or the reality that you're sitting in your dorm alone on a Friday night? Remember those?

Well, this picture isn't one of them, but it does reveal the size and scope of recycling operations. In fact, in this picture are 1,500 LB cubes of paper and cardboard stacked on top of each other, waiting to be shipped to mills both domestically and internationally!!!

While we are very close to the day-to-day, sometimes it's good to pull back and look down from the 10,000-foot view. No, it doesn't get thrown out. No, it doesn't just get buried; your recycling becomes part of something way bigger.

It's no illusion!

Alright, neighbors, it's time to put it on the fridge!!!!

Next week is our Labor Day Slide. There will be no curbside recycling collection next Monday, and our Reichs Ford Road Landfill, Recycling Center, CCC, and Yard Waste program will be closed to give our contractors and crews the rest they deserve. Some of us labor, and some of us work really hard, too, but in a different kind of way.

Remember, because of this closure, curbside collection will slide ONE DAY.
Monday ---> Tuesday
Tuesday ---> Wednesday
Wednesday ---> Thursday
Thursday ---> Friday
Friday ---> Saturday.

Download Recycle Coach for free and get updates and notifications that will help this slide go smoothly and clearly, unlike other methods that may remind us of the change.

Even during the dog days of summer, we must do our best to look forward. C'mon, look forward, look forward. Who is a good recycler pup? Look forward, c'mon. I've got a treat for you. Look forward...

Ok, some of us can't look forward, and that's ok, but when talking about recycling, we must look forward because the future is a big reason why we recycle, reuse, reduce, refuse, and get into composting. Yes, there have been changes, but we aren't returning to how it used to be, so while it's frustrating, acting toward a common goal is better than wishing for an outdated idea.

We're not just barking here. Ensuring we have a stable, integrated solid waste system in Frederick County means a healthier and more livable county for us and the doggos! And isn't that a treat for all of us?

We are out and about today celebrating our amazing community the only way we know how, by answering your recycling, waste reduction, and composting questions. (It's cooler than it sounds.)

We'll be at the Black Frederick Festival with other Frederick County Government, MD agencies all afternoon.
And
The 50th birthday celebration of The Common Market Co-op 12 until 3 at their route 85 location.

We're excited to see and celebrate with you today!

You may have heard that Keith Lee, the reason your kids cover their mouths when they chew, is touring some hotspots in the DMV!

While we'd love to see some love to the local Frederick County food scene, get some love...We also want to remind Keith and all traveling food critics (And you critics that get your fill right here at home...Looking at your FFs) that take-out containers in Frederick County go in the trash or compost if labeled as such and available. Not in the recycling.

Food containers are a thorn and a source of contamination, and sometimes, the rules change if you visit a new place. So please be mindful and do your best. Of course, if you're ever in doubt, throw it out.

Do you follow the Pine-Evans Bin Ratio? Your blue bin should be within 1 Chris Pine of the street where your collection takes place and 1 Chris Evans away from trash bins/compost bins.

Why is this ratio important? The Pine-Evans ratio ensures your recycling can be easily identified and quickly collected.

This ratio is especially important in townhomes, cul-de-sac houses, homes with long driveways, and homes generally set back from the street or parking lot. This ratio is also important in areas where trash collection day is the same day as recycling collection.

While it might seem like a no-brainer, our contractors work fast, and when that happens, mistakes happen where they may accidently mix up trash and recycling. Also, our contractors will not, per our contract, collect items further away than 6 feet from the curb unless there is an authorized accommodation for that address.

And we assure you, following the Pine-Evans Bin Ratio makes you FEEL just as good as these two Chris' look.

On this National Tooth Fairy Day, we recognize a fairy who needs to co-op this holiday due to its niche: the recycle cart-wheel fairy.

That's right. Whenever a cart loses a wheel, this fairy swoops in, replaces the wheel, and leaves something special underneath your lid.

Iu need to summon the Recycle Cart Wheel Fairy, don't hide the broken wheel. Instead, call us at 301-600-2960 or visit our website and report the broken wheel under "Cart Requests."

After your next collection, the cart will magically have a brand new wheel, and if we, the recycle cart-wheel fairy, can't fix it, we'll—ugh, we mean THEY will replace your cart.

Yada, Yada, Yada, then 3 months later, it became another soda can.

Dang it, Bobby, propane tanks don't just get thrown away or put into your blue bin.

These tanks pose risks to staff safety and property and are far from the best way to handle old tanks.

The good news is that there is a robust trade-in program, and if you follow manufacturer instructions and de-valve the tank, it can be recycled via our scrap program.

However, that can be dangerous, and trading your tank in might be the best option.

Safety is always key, and keep that in mind as you look for your propane waste disposal and propane accessory waste disposal needs.