CINCINNATI -- While Amazon's shopping season is coming to an end, Rumpke's holiday recycling season is just beginning.
Rumpke Recycling Operations Manager Bradley Dunn said they go through as much as 1.6 million pounds of recycles material daily. In the next two weeks, Rumpke expects to see a 25 percent increase in items at their recycling plant.
With Christmas coming up soon, Rumpke wants to make sure non-recyclable items don't end up at the plant. Items like Christmas lights, garland, artificial trees and even real trees are not acceptable for the recycling plant. Rumpke workers sort through incoming items to watch for those that don't belong.
"We also have a very good element, which is our people," Dunn said. "Our people have to do a lot of quality control measures and we have to pull out certain things that shouldn't be in the stream."
This time of year, another big concern is when people get gifts, causing them to get rid of their old items. The recycling center isn't always the best option.
"If you're replacing something like your pots and pans with new pots and pans, don't recycle your old pots and pans. Those aren't something we accept," Dunn said. "Again, Christmas lights, things of that nature, textiles, bed sheets, clothing, it's not part of our program."
The sorting is all about safety. Sometimes, it's the smallest things, like batteries, that can be the biggest threat, according to Dunn.
"When the batteries are in your devices, they're typically safe, but when they enter one of our compacting vehicles, they can break down and cause fires," he said.
Rumple has a full list of items they accept on their website.
