If It Prints, I'll Let You Know

It’s so much fun to print especially when you’re printing photos from a recent trip or helping your kids finish an art project. What’s not fun though is when it’s time to replace your printer cartridge. Not only does it mean another spending but also a potential threat to the environment.

Why is that so?

Unless you take your empty ink and toner cartridges to a recycling program, chances are it’ll just find its way to the landfill.

Statistics show more than 375 million empty ink and toner cartridges are thrown away each year, most of them are ending up in landfills. Perhaps unknown to many, each toner that end up in a  landfill constitutes more than 3 pounds of solid waste which could take up to 1,000 years to fully decompose.

But the good news is more businesses are becoming extra conscious with the environmental impact of printer cartridges, and so, many of them have established a recycling program that encourages customers to properly dispose empty cartridges.

Cartridge World, for instance, recycles more than 4.5 million printer cartridges annually.

“Our company recycles millions of printer cartridges every year. But that’s just a small part of the solution,” William Swanson, Chief Executive Officer for Cartridge World North America, told the NBC News.”The challenge is to think about recycling all year long.”

The problem with incorrect disposal of empty cartridges is they could leak remnants of ink that could pollute the surrounding environment. They can also emit chemicals harmful to human health. However, recycling printer cartridges not only gives consumers the chance to save the planet, but also lower the manufacturing costs to a considerable degree. Toner cartridges can be recycles up to 4 time which greatly reduces the amount of environmental harm.