WHAT'S GOING ON?

November 28, 2018

Some cities are closing recycling plants. Others are ending curbside pickup. For recycling to be sustainable, consumers must learn to sort their trash better.

November 09, 2018

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — Nine years ago, when she founded Recycle Across America, Mitch Hedlund’s idea to increase U.S. recycling rates seemed too simple to work.

October 30, 2018

Recycle Across America announced last week that its “Let’s recycle right” promotion effort has received donated advertising from ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, Lamar Advertising, Meredith Publications and more. The campaign, which features celebrities and other public figures, is now the largest recycling campaign in U.S. history, according to Recycle Across America.

October 18, 2018

The Associated Press reported Oct. 10 that the global market for recycled consumer waste has collapsed, shuttering hundreds of processing facilities and leaving many municipalities paying to dispose of paper, plastic and other household recyclables that they used to sell at a modest profit.

October 18, 2018

Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration has allowed a private city recycling hauler to divert tons of residential plastics and paper into landfills the company owns, costing taxpayers twice and aggravating Chicago’s worst-in-the-nation recycling rate, a Better Government Association investigation has found.

September 10, 2018

Actors, Olympic Gold Medalists, Grammy-Award winning musicians, Emmy-Award-Winning Comedians, CEOs, Global Sustainability Executives, Athletes, Government Officials and others featured in National "Let's recycle right!" TV/Billboard/Print/Social Media Campaign

September 17, 2018

“Let’s recycle right!” campaign features tips for proper recycling and introduces the group’s standardized labeling solution for recycling bins.

September 13, 2018

Celebrities, CEOs, global sustainability executives, athletes and government officials are featured in this national “Let’s recycle right!” multimedia campaign.

August 30, 2018

Consistency is key. Visitors traveling between terminals see the same colors and signs. The airport’s sustainability team is also collaborating with businesses to streamline the types of disposable products offered, while promoting reusable materials. If all cups, forks and straws are compostable, for example, it’s easier for visitors to pick a bin.

August 30, 2018

Get back to basics with a waste reduction program that shrinks your company's impact and builds a culture around mindful, sustainable choices. 

August 30, 2018

We’re all guilty of mistakenly throwing away trash in a recycling bin or tossing a paper cup in a disposal meant for plastic.

August 23, 2018

Some of the biggest recycling operations are owned by landfill companies whose profits improve when recycling doesn’t work well.

June 14, 2018

The Solid Waste Association of North America (SWANA) has named Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (Resource Recovery) winner of the 2018 Gold Excellence Award in the Awareness Campaign category. This is the highest award given for an awareness campaign by the industry association. 

May 17, 2018

Recycle Across America Executive Director Mitch Hedlund addressed this problem in an interview with Waste Dive in which she said that education cannot fix this challenge.

April 16, 2018

Standardization could help the waste and recycling industry overcome issues like contamination and confusion at the bin.

February 28, 2018

Waste Dive recently spoke with Hedlund to further understand why she places such an emphasis on standardizing recycling labels — and how she says those moves could help the recycling industry

February 02, 2018

“We are focusing on practical solutions that help drive behavior change,” says Barbieri. “For example, we know that clear and consistent signage is key, so we’ve worked with U.S. Bank Stadium and Recycle Across America to relabel hundreds of bins in the stadium so fans know where to put their waste materials. The waste-to-energy section of the bins inside the stadium has been made smaller to encourage fans to place material in the larger recycling and composting bins. And the opening of the waste receptacle was redesigned to help fans get the right materials in the right bins. Simple changes like that can make a big difference.”

December 04, 2017

Atlanta Public Schools have adopted the standardized labels to help the students at their K-12 schools recycle right thanks to a donation from Bank of America and Recycle Across America. 

November 15, 2017

U.S. Bank Stadium is teaming up with Recycle Across America, a nonprofit organization that created the first and only society-wide standardized labels for bins in an effort to help recycling and closed-loop manufacturing thrive.

November 07, 2017

According to Downtown Orlando's release on the new recycling units, "The labels on our new containers come from Recycle Across America, and bring Orlando into the nationwide movement of standardizing recycling labels to help users better understand what to put in the bin."

August 28, 2017

"...[standardized signage] resulted in an estimated increased collection of nearly 400,000 bottles and plastic cups over the course of the fair, increasing plastic and glass recycling by 22 percent."

August 17, 2017

Together with an all-star cast of Rhode Islanders, Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (Resource Recovery) recently unveiled a campaign aimed to clean up the Ocean State’s mixed recycling.  Created in partnership with Recycle Across America (RAA),

July 14, 2017

Kerri Miller discusses what it means to be an environmental activist (a.k.a. engaged citizen) in today's political climate with Mitch Hedlund, Terry Tempest Williams, and Nicole Rom.

July 07, 2017

The automaker also provided grants to the three pilot parks to provide infrastructure, such as composting equipment, bear-resistant recycling containers and standardized labels, as well as educational support for park visitors, employees and the gateway communities.

June 22, 2017

The world would look a lot different if everyone recycled. Most likely, it would be cleaner and make more use of available resources. Landfills would shrink tremendously. Recycling plants would be an epicenter of activity. 

May 11, 2017

While the outlook for the industry is bleak, Recycle Across America, a nonprofit organization, is finding that the simple solution of creating consistent labels and messaging on recycling bins can help the problem.

April 01, 2017

Check out our Executive Director Mitch Hedlund talk about the recycling industry and the standardized label solution.

November 02, 2016

This NPR interview explains how Recycle Across America’s standardized label solution is evolving recycling symbolism to overcome the public’s confusion that has been trashing recycling in the U.S.

April 05, 2017

Recycle Across America is on a mission. The goal: standardize recycling labels in America. But in order to do it, they needed SEO to get the message out there.

December 15, 2016

Subaru of America (Subaru) and Recycle Across America (RAA) today announce a donation of RAA's standardized recycling label system to support the automaker's zero landfill initiative currently being piloted at three national parks.

January 01, 2020

A non-profit called Recycle Across America is trying to bring that success back to the U.S.:

"Introduce a standardized labeling system for recycling bins," says Mitch Hedlund, executive director of the non-profit.

September 03, 2016

The State Fair generates a lot of waste over its 12-day run — upward of 84 tons. But groups are trying to make the fair more of a reduce-reuse-recycle expo, adding 260 recycling bins this year on top of more than 500 already on site.

August 26, 2016

Wine brand Santa Margherita’s She Shed Event featured a silent auction benefitting Recycle Across America, a nonprofit that Piven supports.

August 25, 2016

Santa Margherita has partnered with Recycle Across America (RAA), a not-for-profit organization dedicated to simplifying the act of recycling for the general public, to increase awareness surrounding various sustainability and environmental issues. The partnership includes on-site educational awareness and a silent auction at the unveiling event with proceeds benefitting RAA's educational programs.

August 18, 2016

All three pilot parks have committed to adopting the standardized recycling labels from Recycle Across America that have been proven to increase recycling levels, reduce confusion at the bin and make it easier for park visitors to recycle correctly.

August 17, 2016

As summer heats up, Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) announces a hot new agreement with Recycle Across America (RAA). On Earth Day (April 22) Rhode Island became the first state in the nation to adopt RAA’s standardized label solution for recycling bins, making 36,000 free labels available to all of RI’s public schools.  

July 21, 2016

EPA’s most recent report places the plastics recovery rate at 9%. Why does so little plastic find its way back into the system?  Recycle Across America's standardized labels help people recycle plastics properly ...

July 18, 2016

Check out RAA's partner Pivot TV's  Season 3 of Human Resources.  Human Resources is an unconventional, comedic, behind-the-scenes look at TerraCycle, an innovative recycling company whose mission is to eliminate the idea of waste. 

June 21, 2016

Rhode Island is the first state in the nation to join the national movement with Recycle Across America aimed at using a standardized recycling label. Major corporations, such as Whole Foods and Disneyland, have already joined the mission as well...

June 13, 2016

Referred to by The New York Times as ‘one of the most important environmental fixes taking root today,’ Recycle Across America’s standardized recycling label goes viral.

April 24, 2016

Whole Food Market has just partnered with Recycle Across America (RAA) for its “Leaders for Progress” initiative and its “Let’s recycle right!” campaign.  As of April, the initiative has been launched in all 26 Florida stores to help further educate and enhance the public’s recycling habits. The stores recycling bins are now all labeled with easy-to- understand single-stream recycling and all team members have been trained fully to help assist in recycling.

April 20, 2016

Celebrities such as Alanis Morissette, Bill Maher, Angie Harmon, Anthony Mackie, Johnny Galecki, Whoopi Goldberg, Jeremy Piven, Olivia Stuck, AnnaSophia Robb, Kristen Bell, Stana Katic, Gabby Reece, Kendrick Sampson, and many others will be featured on Lamar Advertising’s digital billboards in promotion of Recycle Across America’s “Let’s recycle right!” campaign for Earth Week.   World reknowned celebrity photographer Timothy White donated his talent with each of the celebrities to begin to make recycling shine!

April 14, 2016

We are so proud of the tiny but mighty state of Rhode Island for being the VERY FIRST STATE in the U.S. to adopt the society-wide standardized labeling system to make it easier for people to begin to recycle right, wherever they are in the state.  They are starting to roll-out the standardized labels in their K-12 schools and government buildings first. 

April 07, 2016

At 2016 Brand Leaders Solution Summit, strategy is introduced to address: mass closures of U.S. recycling plants; challenges with sustainable packaging; and waste in oceans. Followed by world’s first live-streamed celebrity PSA campaign.

March 30, 2016

St. Johns County is joining the nationwide movement to implement standardized labels on recycling bins to make it easier for the public to recycling properly. Along with Recycle Across America, St. Johns County's goal is to do something really simple: to standardize the labels for recycling bins across the country.

September 22, 2015

A study published by researchers at Yale University in the journal Nature Climate Change determined that 289 million tons of waste was sent to landfills in 2012, more than twice the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's figure of 135 million tons.

October 01, 2014

Bill is the perfect person to talk about trash and our ever- growing global problem of it. If I had to distill it down to one thing, what I appreciate most about him is his ability to make people feel uncomfortable.

September 01, 2015

MSNBC Tony Doupokil interviews Mitch Hedlund about standardized labels and how unnecessarily confusing recycling is in the U.S.

August 27, 2015

Angie Harmon, Kristen Bell, Mark Ruffalo and dozens of other celebrities are lending their superstar status to help Recycle Across America spread its “recycle right” message to the nation.

August 21, 2015

As most of us have recently been hearing across the media spectrum, recycling today is in trouble. Recyclers can’t secure the margins that make recycling profitable, recovery rates are stagnant, and waste management companies are looking at the future of the U.S.’s recycling infrastructure with a skeptical eye.

August 19, 2015

Televised public service announcements created by Recycle Across America (RAA) have been scheduled for increased airplay in August 2015, according to the not-for-profit organization that describes itself as “dedicated to simplifying the act of recycling for the general public to help them recycle more and help them recycle right.”

August 19, 2015

If you're confused about the nuances of recycling — Does the greasy pizza box get recycled or trashed? Do glass and aluminum get separated? — join the club.

April 22, 2015

As Earth Day draws upon us, Kiehl’s on Montana in Santa Monica turned into a private event to unveil the environmental partnership with actors Elizabeth Olsen and Maggie Q. 

April 21, 2015

In honor of Earth Day, nonprofit organization Recycle Across America (RAA) is partnering with Kiehl’s Since 1851 (Kiehl’s), to donate 65,000 of the new society-wide standardized labels for recycling bins to 650 K-12 schools across the United States. 

September 12, 2014

Today on GreenIsGood: Recycle Across America's plan is simple: Provide standardized recycling labels throughout the country to help recycling rates rise. 

May 13, 2014

The latest figures from the U.S. EPA show that the combined recycling and composting rate for MSW in the has fallen from 34.7% in 2011 to 34.5% in 2012.

July 25, 2012

What if there were something that could create 1.5 million new jobs, reduce carbon emissions equal to taking 50 million cars off the road, cut dependence on foreign oil, increase exports, save water, improve air quality and reduce toxic waste? 

June 21, 2012

Statistics tell us that people want to do “the right thing” environmentally, but let’s be honest…doing the right thing is often confusing or too much work.