Sustainable Moorestown and Moorestown Hardware are encouraging residents to recycle unused and broken holiday lights.
Every year during the holiday season, home decorators pull strings of lights from storage only to plug them in and find that their once glowing strings no longer light up. Sustainable Moorestown, in partnership with Moorestown Hardware, is offering residents an alternative to throwing out unusable lights in an effort to cut down on landfill waste.
Sustainable Moorestown has placed a dropbox at Moorestown Hardware for residents to drop off broken lights. When the box fills, Wolfgang Skacel, chair of Sustainable Moorestown, transports the lights to the Burlington County Resource Recovery Complex in Columbus for recycling.
Skacel said Burlington County a few years ago implemented an initiative where it encouraged residents to put their lights in recycling bins, but when the initiative fell by the wayside, Sustainable Moorestown decided to continue the effort on a more local level.
For that reason, Sustainable Moorestown approached Moorestown Hardware with the idea of putting a recycling box in the store. Co-owner Juliana Bender said when Sustainable Moorestown approached them with the idea, they agreed it would be a good idea to put a recycling box in front of their light display, so shoppers coming to purchase new lights could drop off their damaged ones.
“I think it’s wonderful,” Bender said. “Why put it in the trash when it can be taken to the recycling center when it can be stripped down?”
Skacel said 2017 marks Sustainable Moorestown’s third year of collecting lights, and to date, they’ve collected just less than a 1,000 pounds worth of strings. The strings contain a copper wiring that can be reused.
“What we hear is it’s too far to go up to county facility in Columbus to make a trip for a string of lights,” Skacel said. “This makes it much more convenient.”
Skacel said what they’ve found is many people are slowly replacing their incandescent bulbs with the LED variety. He said if the strings are tossed in with the general trash collection, they’re taking up valuable landfill space.
This year, Sustainable Moorestown put out its box in early November, and it was filled within a matter of days, Skacel said. Bender said the box has been filling quickly, and she’s had to call Skacel at least once a week to come pick the lights up.
Thus far, the feedback has been very positive, Skacel said.
“They like the convenience of being able to go some place locally and drop off their lights,” Skacel said.
Sustainable Moorestown’s box will remain in Moorestown Hardware until February, so people taking their strings down can utilize the recycling option after the holidays as well. Moorestown Hardware is located at 300 Mill St. in Moorestown.
