Ooops – every picture tells a story. Landfill or not?

Filed in Blog by on January 20, 2009 10 Comments
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broken christmas tree decorationOk, I promise this will be our last Christmas post; I think we can safely say Christmas is over now. But we do have a bit of a confession which is weighing heavy on our soul.

We had one mishap over Christmas. One inevitable breakage of a glass Christmas Tree decoration. I figured it would have to go in the bin. Mr Green has put it in a bag and intends to put it in with the glass recycling at our local recycling centre.

What do you think? How do you dispose of one of these responsibly?

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About the Author ()

I am a long time supporter of the Green and Sustainable lifestyle. After being caught in the Boscastle floods in 2004, our family begun a journey to respect and promote the importance of Earth's fragile ecosystem, that focussed on reducing waste. Inspired by the beauty and resourcefulness of this wonderful planet, I have published numerous magazine articles on green issues and the author of four books.

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  1. maisie says:

    I think I would treat it as you do light bulbs and would have to put it in with the landfill rubbish.

    Maybe a phonecall to double check.

  2. What a gorgeous bauble – and what a shame. As Maisie says, it is worth calling your council. If you were to put it into the glass recycling bins, it could just contaminate the load. Peter over at Environmental Notes told me a story about how even a pyrex dish contaminated a recycled glass collection. However, some collections are used to create aggregate for road surfaces. In which case it could be a different story. So do check, otherwise it’s probably some delicate crafty project or landfill…good luck 😀 x

  3. Poppy says:

    What colour would you put it in though Mrs G or do you have mixed glass collection?

  4. Sarah says:

    Our glass kerbside collection is mixed and they sort it when it arrives. I’d still hesitate before putting something like a bauble in though.

  5. Katy says:

    It looks to be thin enough that you could crush it quite easily. If you crush it up really finely is it still harmful? I have no idea, but I thought maybe it could be used decoratively somehow, like glitter – but only as long as it wasn’t still sharp to touch of course.

  6. Layla says:

    I’d hesitate putting it in with the glass too… Best to call, probably.. (and even then, might be good to do some research..)
    An artsy project from this could be lovely.. maybe with papermache (paper+water+flour, maybe other glue or some sort of string/rubber band would be needed too..) or something? (or donating for an artsy project, to someone with potential skills & interest..)

    Otherwise, it’s probably best to just not break these.. 🙂
    I know that’s not helpful, sorry…

    even glass for drinking or such (especially old stuff) has sometimes contained iffy chemicals to make it pretty…
    so ideally we’d have cheap ‘substance-detectors’ to know what was used..

  7. Ablissa says:

    Our recycling does not take ornaments. They say the paint and the mirror film inside contaminates the process.
    I saw a suggestion on the internet to save all your broken glass ornaments, crush them into glitter sized pieces (carefully!) and then reuse them to make new ornaments. (Glue onto old burnt out lightbulbs.)
    Know any glass bead makers? I wonder if they might be able to add them to some glass beads…
    Another suggestion was to take the pieces and glue them pretty side out to picture frames/mirror frames into a sort of mosaic pattern.

  8. Di Hickman says:

    What I’d do personally is buy a glass bauble, one that you can fill (you can get these from hobby/craft stores). Break the existing one up even further like someone suggested, then fill the other bauble with it. Kind of a reminder to be green with your decorations.

  9. Compostwoman says:

    I’d be inclined to find a rcycled art type person who would LOVE to re use it in some wonderful art.

    or do something similar with it myself.

    Definately NOT into the glass bin though!

  10. I like Di’s idea! As for recycling, I don’t think it goes in with mixed glass. There is probably too much paint on it. Interested to hear what you find out.

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