Recycling? What Are The Purple Containers For?

Many folks in the tristates are fortunate to have those big yellow city recycling bins and curbside pickup. Some of us are not so fortunate and have to do a little more leg-work to get our recycling done.

The Farber family chooses to do our own recycling, so about once a month we overload the car and drive down to 925 Kerper Court in Dubuque. That's the location of the City of Dubuque Municipal Service Center. (You can also visit the Dubuque Metropolitan Area Solid Waste Agency landfill at 101 Airborne Road in Dubuque.)

We do a lot of newspaper and cardboard but recently noticed some new purple containers.

The DMASWA was recently awarded a grant from the Iowa Department of Natural Resources Environmental Management System program to purchase these purple roll off containers specifically for purpose of establishing drop-off locations from glass recycling.

According to a press release, the first load of  over 48,000 pounds of glass was recently shipped to Ripple Glass where it will be recycled into new bottles and fiberglass insulation.

If you'd like to start recycling your glass, here are the items you can put in the purple containers:

• Rinsed Glass food and beverage containers (all colors, labels can stay on)
• Drinking Vessels (pint, wine, mason jars)
• Candle Jars (leftover wax okay)
• Cosmetic bottles/jars

For more information you can contact Ken Miller, Solid Waste Agency Administrator at 563-589-4354 or kmiller@cityofdubuque.org.

Keep saving our planet, one bottle and jar at a time!

~CMF