MORRIS COUNTY — Morris County Municipal Utilities Authority (MCMUA) Recycling Inspectors will check your recycling, tag unacceptable items, and leave behind contaminated recycling bins.
Due to these strict requirements for collecting only acceptable materials in the recycling stream, the MCMUA may leave those recycling setouts with unacceptable items at the curb.
After contaminated recyclables are left at the curb, residents will have to CORRECT the issues and wait until the following scheduled recycling collection to put their acceptable recyclables out for curbside collection. When in doubt, throw it out and keep your acceptable recyclables clean, empty, and dry.
The goal is to ensure that bulk recycling loads sent by the MUA to the recycling market don’t get rejected (and sent to a landfill) because they contain too many items that don’t meet recycling standards.
The most problematic recycling contaminants found by the Morris County MUA include:
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- Plastic bags (Take them to a retail store with a dedicated bin for bags. They jam machinery.)
- Plastic film/plastic packaging
- Foam/Styrofoam (Discard in the trash.)
- Hangers (Plastic, metal, or wood — they jam up the machinery.)
- Food waste
- Wood scraps
- Plastic bottles/containers coded #3, #4, #6 & #7 (Recycle only plastic bottles/containers coded #1, #2 & #5. No medicine bottles at all).
Just for clarification, these items don’t belong in your recycling container either: Paper coffee cups, dirty pizza boxes, paper towels, and some less likely items such as diapers, bowling balls, hypodermic needles, animal carcasses, batteries, and electronics. Batteries can cause a fire at a recycling center. People sort recycling – not machines, so keep them safe.
Also, recyclables must be empty, clean, and dry — without food residue.
Find out which items are acceptable for recycling by clicking here.
