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Agriculture Recycling

From used to useful

Jun 5, 2019 | 2:17 PM

A provincial organization is encouraging farmers to play a role in protecting the environment.

Saskatchewan Association for Resource Recovery executive director Ethan Richardson said farmers are already environmentally conscious individuals but more can always be done.

“We want to make sure we keep our soil and water clean and safe for the next generation,” Richardson said. “From our organization’s perspective one of the easiest ways to do that is to recycle your used motor oil, antifreeze, filters and the associated containers.”

Richardson said the main message this year is with the 10-gallon oil containers.

“It doesn’t take a lot of oil to contaminate a water source. A million litres of water can be contaminated with just one litre of used oil so we want to make sure that gets recycled and disposed of appropriately.” Richardson said. “So they’re not burnt or just thrown in with regular garbage where they may end up impacting our environment.”

“One of the good things about the oil containers is that they can have a second life. They are a high value plastic and once it’s washed that plastic can be sold into North American markets for remanufacture into a variety of products,” Richardson said.

There are free public drop-offs in over 35 communities in Saskatchewan for small volumes of used oil, filters, antifreeze and their containers. For the large volumes that are difficult to transport on their own there are collectors that will visit farms and pick that material up.

A list of drop-off depots or collectors can be found at www.usedoilrecyclingsk.ca.

alice.mcfarlane@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: AliceMcF

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