Where Does the Plastic Go After I Recycle It?

SMAN 1 Semarapura’s Eco-Club members run a very successful recycling program at their school.  They recently asked me: Where does the plastic, paper and glass we recycle at our school travel to after it leaves our school?

To answer that question we put on our new Eco Club T-Shirts, hopped on a bus and traveled to Bali Recycling in Mas, about 30 minutes away.   Here we learned that 90% to 95% of the waste we send to them is recycled into products such as handbags, wallets, shoes, pallets, glasses, sweaters etc.  The remainder that can’t be recycled is sent to the Temesi Landfill where it is responsibly managed.

Olivier teaching us about what happens to what we recycle.

Owner Olivier Poullion walked us through the whole process from when the material arrives at Bali Recycling through how he converts the garbage into pretty cool products.  He urged us to…