Nearly one million printer cartridges are thrown away every day at an average. This contributes a high amount of waste that is produced commercially as well as domestically. There are several harmful effects that the environment undergoes due to these used printer cartridges. Printer cartridges can be easily recycled. We can easily donate printer cartridges to charity, and we can reduce pollution and environmental damages. Apart from that, charity houses can refill such cartridges and use them for their own office works. That will save their cost and we can donate printer cartridges to charity as a noble cause.
Why Should We Recycle Printer Cartridges?
Before looking into the various ways to donate printer cartridges to charity, let us first look at the reasons why we should consider recycling printer cartridges.
Printer cartridges contain volatile organic compounds (VOCs) which are heavy metals, and such metals can contaminate the soil and water. The toner or carbon black in printer cartridges has also been classified as carcinogenic by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. Discarded printer cartridges average at around a staggering 375 million units per year. All of these ends up in landfills. Apart from that, such cartridges are packed with some plastic materials which are not renewable. So, we cannot decompose such printer cartridges in the natural process, and they can create some harmful effects on the environment. Moreover, the production of a single unit of toner produces 4.8 kg of carbon dioxide. So, it is better to donate printer cartridges to charity and they can recycle such cartridges for their further uses.
How to Donate Your Printer Cartridges to Charity?
Now that we know the advantage of donating printer cartridges for charity, let us look at a few methods how to recycle your old printer cartridge in a way that can benefit the environment as well as the society. Here are a few ways that used printer cartridges can be used to fund the charity of your choice.
- Recycling Companies Which Pay Charities Online: This is one of the most recent and probably one of the most popular methods of recycling printer cartridges. There are companies which help in the recycling of used printer cartridges and they will earn some money by selling these recycled cartridges. Then they will donate their profit to the charity. You can donate your printer cartridges to this company at free of cost. There is a confirmation that is sent to you on the receipt of your empty cartridges. After that, you can access their website which will give you an estimate of the amount of money that will be generated, or rather, saved because of your contribution. You can then ask for the money to be forwarded to a charity of your choice by choosing from a list of charities listed on the website. This makes it easy for you to donate printer cartridges to charity.
- Recycling Companies Which Pay You Cash: Sometimes, the recycling company might not have links to your preferred charity. In that case, you can opt for recycling companies which operate on the same principle, except, they pay you cash. You can collect the cash from the company and then send the amount to the charity.
- Help Out Locally: If you do not produce empty printer cartridges on a commercial scale, you can still make use of the empty cartridges you produce for a good cause. Keep an eye out for local recycling drives by schools and non-profit organizations.
Recycling printer cartridges help in reducing solid waste and help you to save natural resources during production. This can be coupled with your social responsibility by helping those in need if you donate your printer cartridges to charity.
