the low down on green living
August 15th, 2008
Should You Recycle Your Spaghetti Jars?
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In our blog we try to identify, understand and evaluate many of today’s new and complex green technologies. From geothermal heat pumps to the latest in solar panels, green roofs to graywater systems, if it’s green we try to cover it. So I was a bit surprised (and slightly embarassed) when a friend emailed the other night and asked me a seemingly simple question I couldn’t immediately answer: if I’m trying to do the eco-friendly thing, should I wash out a spaghetti jar and recycle it or just throw it in the trash? Is there any chance that, by using hot water to rinse it out, I’m un-doing the environmental benefits of recycling?
My immediate reaction was to think “of course you should recycle,” and some initial research showed that most if not all out there on the web concurred. However, I found very few numbers that proved that this was the case. Not able to let it rest, I set out to calculate some of my own. After several hours, I had the beginnings of an answer (and please share your thoughts if you disagree or have more to add!). I decided to focus on energy use / carbon emissions and water use, since the benefits of avoiding the landfill are clear.
Energy and Carbon Footprint
To do this right, I needed to find some information about the energy consumption and associated carbon footprint of the entire process of producing glass, from securing raw materials up through manufacturing and through to distribution of the finished product. I also needed the same information for the recycling path. Fortunately, the good folks at the EPA had done a great analysis of this very topic. After some fairly complicated conversions, you can boil a spaghetti sauce jar down to this: the process needed to take sand and turn it into that spaghetti jar on your shelf creates about ten ounces of carbon dioxide per jar. So, anything LESS than that in the recycling process means that you’re reducing your overall carbon footprint. After doing some calculations using the EPA information, it turns out that recycling the jar SAVES about six ounces of CO2 when you compare it to a) having to make that amount of new glass and b) sending that jar to the landfill.
Now, to the question at hand: what if it’s full of caked-on sauce and you have to use hot water to rinse it out? Using the equations behind the hot water portion of LIL’s Environmental Impact Calculator, and assuming that you heat hot water with natural gas to the relatively low temperature of 120 degrees (conservative assumptions), then as long as you use less than three gallons of hot water you’re still reducing your carbon footprint. Assuming that you don’t have a low-flow kitchen faucet, then this means you could run your hot water up to about 90 seconds at full blast before you’ve undone the carbon benefits of recycling that jar.
Water
Water usage was a bit trickier. I found some data that suggests (after some analysis) that it takes about half a gallon of water to make each jar, although that amount can vary quite a bit depending on whether or not the manufacturer reuses water during glassmaking. This means that, to come out even on the water front, you’d have to only use about 15 seconds of water (full blast) during your rinsing process. That’s definitely do-able, but you don’t have quite the room to err as you do with carbon emissions.
Now, these numbers might not seem that large unless you eat spaghetti every night! But remember that this is a worst-case scenario involving a very gunky jar - the rationale for recycling is even stronger for the easier-to-clean beverage bottles we use every day. The typical person in the US uses over 130 glass bottles or jars a year - that’s about 40 pounds of carbon dioxide and 60 gallons of water saved per person per year, and over 100 pounds of waste kept out of landfills.
So the next time you go to empty out that pasta jar, rest assured that you’re doing a good thing for the planet. But to be safe, use a scrub brush, some elbow grease, and shut off the water unless you’re specifically rinsing!
Comments
robin
August 15th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
I just sit the jar in the sink. Between rinsing out the coffeepot, kids washing hands, and scrubbing pots and pans after dinner (the stuff that doesn’t fit in the dishwasher), the jar is clean by the end of the night, with no superfluous water usage.
ClaudeB
August 16th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
There is a third choice and I’m surprised you didn’t mentioned it. Before recycling or throwing the jar in the garbage can, you should consider reusing the container… you know, the second of the 3 R’s!
Jason Pelletier, Low Impact Living
August 17th, 2008 at 11:21 am
Claude:
You are correct. The best thing to do with glass containers is to not use them in the first place (the “reduce” portion of three Rs), but after that reuse is certainly better than recycling. I had originally included this in my piece, but thought that it would be pretty challenging to reuse the hundreds of glass containers a typical family uses in a year!
We are actually going backwards in this regard. In times past, glass bottles were reused commercially (remember the milk man?). The carbon emissions from re-use transportation and cleaning are less than they are for either recycling or discarding. Perhaps in the future reuse will once again become a viable large-scale alternative to recycling, but only if we as a society ever do put a price on carbon emissions.
Leigh
August 17th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
see, now I have read, there is really no need to clean the jar… you can leave the lime in your Corona bottle too… it will all get burned off in the recycling process. The only reason to clean it, is to keep it from smelling in your bins… please reply if anyone knows otherwise….
Janae
August 18th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
I agree with Leigh, you don’t need to wash the jars out completely. I usually just run about a quarter cup of water (cold is fine) into the jar, put the lid back on and give it a few good shakes to get the majority of the contents out. Then I toss the empty jar in our recycling bin (which has a lid, is lined with a plastic bag that we reuse, and gets emptied into our larger bin out in the garage every other day or so to reduce odor).
Keep recycling as easy as possible and more people are apt to do it.
I reuse jars sometimes too (but one only needs so many jars). Short, wide mouth ones are excellent for leftover onion (odor tends to ruin plastic containers, so I keep a couple glass jars just for onions). I also make my own refrigerator dill pickles, and reuse peanut butter jars, etc. for that process. They are also great for holding dry beans, etc. once the bags are opened.
I don’t use “ziploc” bags, I always find a way to utilize some sort of reusable container. Not only is it not that hard, it saves money!
Jason Pelletier, Low Impact Living
August 18th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Leigh / Janae:
Thanks for your comments. There are some places around that are more picky than others. Certain cities and areas won’t recycle dirty items, and they certainly won’t recycle white paper that has been stained by stuff from bottles and cans. I’ve also heard (not officially, but off the record) that some recycling operations / departments will just throw out visibly dirty items during the sort to be safe.
It sounds like you are lucky and live in areas where it is less of an issue!
Rita
August 19th, 2008 at 8:52 am
Like Janae, I reuse glass jars for leftovers in the frig and in the freezer.
Many make great containers for collectibles like marbles or seashells sitting on a window shelf.
Years ago my dad stored nuts, bolts, nails, etc in jars.
I think I have reuse genes. I hate to toss something if it can have a second life.
Also, if you are running the dishwasher anyway, what’s another jar and lid.
Thanks for all the ideas!!
Rita
August 19th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Jason,
Your comment about not using glass in the first place. Could you explain what would be better than using glass? I assumed that glass is preferable to plastic containers.
Jason Pelletier, Low Impact Living
August 19th, 2008 at 9:10 am
Rita:
There are many ways that we can cut our use of things just by changes in habits / smarter shopping. For instance, use tap or filtered tap water instead of bottled water (whether it’s plastic or fancier spring water bottled in glass). Throw a twist of lime or lemon in it if you fear the taste of tap. Buy larger containers of sauce, condiments, etc rather than multiple smaller ones - the glass per unit of “stuff” goes down this way. Oh, and of course, buy kegs of beer
Anne
August 19th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Also remember that glass can be reused, and recycled many times without losing it’s structural integrity…
Nancy
August 19th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
Thank you for this column! We were having this exact conversation at a BBQ this past weekend. Apparently in Los Angeles everything has to be clean or the city won’t recycle it.
Rob Johnson
August 19th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
I reuse all my jars to put stuff in for my lunches. I just wah in the dishwasher along with my dishes. My dishwasher is energy star rated. THen I have nice containers to put in my little lunch box! SO there I am not eating take out (another green bonus), I save money too!
jefe
August 19th, 2008 at 6:43 pm
Any jar like that, say for example a sticky peanut butter jar, I fill up half way with water, put the lid back on and shake like crazy. Then I let it sit for hours or even a day. Next time I see it, I shake it like crazy again, and then flip it over, and let it sit, shaking again from time to time.
I used to fill the entire jar up, but realized I could get away with filling only half
Using only half a jar of water, then flipping it over gets both ends of the jar clean eventually.
One final rinse and then its very clean, ready for recycling.
Mike
August 19th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Now my question is should you buy a product with a glass or plastic container assuming it will be recycled. (no reuse)
Harriet
August 20th, 2008 at 4:09 am
Another way of looking at part of this conversation-spaghetti sauce specifically and other items in general can be made in quantity and frozen for homemade micro meals for less traveled miles, less energy use, beter nutrition and quality control, etc. Inone day in one pot I can make enough sauce for the two of us to last 2 months, then same with soup, or casserole then 3 or 4 main meals a week is just reheated quickly; less energy used.
The glass jars or other reused continers can be used to freeze the sauces or soups or casseroles cut into serving sizes before freezing.
By the way, recycling centers require washing becasue of rodents and roach preblems in their facilities not to mention the stink. We have such wonderful facility in our small town (very proud of it) that people try hard to keep containers relatively clean when recycling.
Harriet
Kristine Bradof
August 20th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
Jason,
I’ve always supported recycling, but the relative environmental benefit of recycling a given material depends on distance to markets. The EPA report states that the methodology used to estimate GHG emissions from recycling did not allow for variations in transportation distances. I haven’t had a chance to read the report in detail. Do you know if they assumed the same transportation distances to both landfill and glass remanufacturer? Where I live, those distances are about 30 and 300 miles, respectively. A sustainability colloquium at Michigan Tech about four years ago did a preliminary environmental analysis of landfilling vs. recycling glass from here. Sadly, the impact of transporting that heavy material ten times farther appeared to offset any environmental benefits of recycling, which was also more expensive. Waste Management and others stopped recycling glass from the Upper Peninsula because of the cost and the fact that much of it ended up in more distant landfills due to contamination (from other types of glass, not spaghetti sauce!) or lack of demand.
Jesse
August 21st, 2008 at 10:38 pm
My understanding is that when you recycle, not all things actually get recycled (no matter how clean) due to limited recycling infrastructure. Your mileage may vary. If there is a chance it might not get recycled in your area, it’s MUCH better to simply reuse. Perhaps there are sites where you can drop off excess when you start to feel like they take up more sq. ft. in your own home than yourself, heh.
jill
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:08 am
I learned this trick from my inlaws in Germany-where they recycle everything…peel off the label on the jar or can and put it in the dishwasher…it comes out clean for reuse or a stink free recycle bin.
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