New Program for Recycling Cigarette Waste

Imagine how many cigarette butts end up in landfills, or get tossed as litter along highways, in parks, etc. 

Cigarette butts account for 38% of the litter collected on roadways.  Not only is littering a major ongoing problem, but until now there hasn’t been a way to actually recycle or repurpose cigarette butts.

Many people believe that cigarette filters are biodegradable.  The fact is that they are not.  They are made with a plastic that can actually leach toxic chemicals into the environment.

Image reprinted by permission of TerraCycle, Inc.

Now a company called TerraCycle can recycle this non-biodegradable waste into a variety of products such as industrial plastic pallets, jewelry, vases, guitar picks and tobacco composting.  TerraCycle has the answer to many hard to recycle materials. 

You can research the many products that can be recycled, including the aforementioned cigarette butts at TerraCycle.com.  For cigarette butt waste, if you are age 21 or older, you can sign up to be a part of their Cigarette Waste Brigade®.  TerraCycle will provide free UPS shipping labels for people to mail in the cigarette waste that you collect.

I am grateful that this issue has now been addressed and a company has offered an alternative regarding the specific issue of cigarette butt waste.  I would like to encourage folks that smoke, or know someone that does, to look into this specific recycling program.  I hope that recycling cigarette butts will catch on like wildfire.

Submitted by Billie Baumann, World Bird Sanctuary Outreach Coordinator