Styrofoam Collection Events

Meredith Recycle Rotary Styrofoam
Styrofoam Recycling Collection Events
 
Polystyrene foam (Styrofoam)—Expanded polystyrene foam (EPS) is a #6 plastic often referred to by the trade name “Styrofoam.” EPS is 90% air and typically lightweight and bulky. It's valued for being sturdy, lightweight, and capable of preserving temperature, resisting water, and absorbing shocks. This makes it great for keeping perishable items fresh during transportation. It's widely used, especially in packaging (40%) and insulation.
 
Typically, Styrofoam is single-use packaging that becomes bulky volume in our trash streams, a challenge to municipal transfer stations.
 
What has started as the right thing to do, reasoned by one of our own Rotarians, Harry Reichlen, has gained momentum at the Rotary Club to recycle all styrofoam in the town of Meredith. Working with the Meredith Town Municipal Department, the Rotary Club collects EPS from the town residents every three months at Meredith’s Solid Waste Facility recycling building.
 
The Next Collection event is September 21, 2024.
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Styrofoam Collection Day - March 16, 2024

The Town of Meredith recently approved Rotary to place signage at Meredith’s Solid Waste Facility before our first recycle collection day on March 16th, 2024, to help get the word out that a recycling day would happen.
 
While Harry was putting up the sign, people dumping trash at the transfer station stopped and asked if they could give their Styrofoam today instead of throwing it in the trash. In the short time Harry was out there, he collected five bags!  
Our collection stand was at Meredith’s Solid Waste Facility on Saturday, March 16, 2024. Residents stopped by to donate their styrofoam packaging materials. Two of our volunteers, Heidi Barrett-Kitchen (standing on left) and Bonnie Ireland, received the styrofoam pieces and packed them into large plastic bags for transport to the recycling center in Guilford.
Here is Harry Reichlen after loading all the collected styrofoam at the end of a successful collection day for transport to the Guilford recycling center. With this initial success, Meredith Rotary plans to hold future
collection days once every three months.
This is a sample guide for collection of recyclable styrofoam. Items must be clean or uncontaiminated. We cannot accept foam insulation, plastic peanuts or pipe insulation.
 
 

What happens to recycled styrofoam?

Now, the collected foam goes to the Gilford recycle center to be transformed into dense blocks, which are then sold to Canadian-based Soprema to be turned into building construction materials. This picture shows how styrofoam materials can be used in construction.