Paid recycling services - verifying what they do, and best total impact?

Post date: 2021-04-16 03:45:47

Is there any way to verify that recycling services like Ridwell and GreenDisk actually keep stuff out of landfill? Should I put money and effort into better landfill policies rather than my own individual trash?

I've been considering using recycling services, and I'm trying to decide if it's money well spent.

A friend is in the Ridwell service area and is thinking of signing up, but wondered how anyone would know if it was a scam where they just take your money and dump your stuff in landfill anyway. Meanwhile, I've been considering using GreenDisk for all my obsolete data CD-Rs, and it seems like a lot of money to keep, basically, one or two big bins of trash out of my trash pickup.

So, two main questions:

1. Is there any way to verify that a recycling service actually does what they say they do, and keeps stuff out of landfill?

2. Is it better for the environment to pay a service to try to keep my own trash out of landfill, or to spend that money and time to work for better waste policies that affect everybody's disposal impact?

Thanks!

Kristi

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