L.A. Adds Food and Beverage Cartons to Recycling Program

Compiled by the Waste Age staff

Los Angeles has expanded its residential curbside recycling program to include paper-based food and beverage cartons, the kind that hold such products as milk, juice and chicken broth. Los Angeles joins approximately 200 other California cities and towns in providing paper-based carton recycling, according to a press release issued by The Carton Council, which advised Los Angeles on the program expansion.

According to Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation statistics cited in the press release, Los Angeles currently has a 65 percent landfill diversion rate. The city has set a goal of increasing the rate to 70 percent by 2013.

“Los Angeles continues striving toward being the greenest city in the nation,” said Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in the press release. “That is why the city of Los Angeles has partnered with the Carton Council to make sure that liquid food and beverage cartons are not left to the landfills but are recycled in the most responsible and efficient way possible.”

“Our city has a long-term goal of achieving zero waste, so we want to create and take advantage of all the opportunities available to recycle more items such as cartons, and to continue to increase the number of recyclable materials that can be saved from landfilling,” added Enrique C. Zaldivar, director of the Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation, in the press release.

RELATED RESOURCES:

• "L.A. Adds Milk, Juice, Soup Cartons to Curbside Recycling Program" (Los Angeles Times)

• Los Angeles' Counting Down to Zero Waste Plan website