The other day I replaced the Windshield Wipers on my Honda Accord and our Toyota Camry. After I was done I took all the packaging, and put it in the recycling bin. I usually try to recycle as much as I can, as I feel this is being a responsible and respectful citizen.
Something occurred to me while I was about to throwout the old Windshield Wipers, Why aren't they recyclable? Think about this for a moment, there have to be millions upon millions of Windshield Wipers that are replaced every year on all the cars and trucks on our roads. Then there must be millions and millions of old ones being tossed in the garbage. All those Windshield Wipers and Wiper Blades are crowding our landfills. I think they are going there unnecessarily.
Wipers are made of plastic and rubber, meaning they should be able to be recycled easily. I bet it wouldn't be to hard to reconstitute the plastic and rubber in them. TV's and old electronics are broken everyday and are given new life in form or new metals, glass, plastic etc.. So why not Windshield Wipers and Wiper Blades?
There might even be savings involved if manufacturers didn't have to spend as much money on buying new materials to make Windshield Wipers and Wiper Blades. They could be collecting old ones, and breaking them down to be recycle and reused for maker new Wipers. This would save money and precious resources. (They would also get extra brownie points from environmentalists!)
To start what I think could be a revolution of recycling Windshield Wipers, I put the old ones in the recycling bin. I don't know if they will be recycled, but it would be cool if they were!
Please share your thoughts on this. Do you think Windshield Wipers and Wiper Blades should be recyclable too?