On any sustainability journey, you’ll be confronted by roadblocks. One major issue I’ve encountered while pursuing a greener lifestyle is how to handle products that are generally not accepted by my city’s curbside recycling program. Granola bar wrappers, chip bags, and all those Taco Bell fire sauce packets I’ve used to spice up my Crunch Wraps over the years are undoubtably living for all eternity in a landfill.

But what if there was a way to recycle those problematic products?

TerraCycle is a unique social enterprise focused on “Eliminating the Idea of Waste.” They offer free recycling programs nationwide in the U.S. as well as operating in 21 countries worldwide to take hard-to-recycle items and turn them into something new. A perfect solution!

However, when something sounds too good to be true, it typically is. And TerraCycle has come under fire over the last year with some hefty allegations of corporate greenwashing that led to the filing of a major lawsuit against the organization and several of its most notable corporate partners.

So, buckle up, because we are about to spill the tea and give you the rundown on what we know about TerraCycle, the limitations of its recycling programs, and the current legal actions levied against the organization.

ABOUT TERRACYCLE

TerraCycle was established in 2001 by CEO Tom Szaky, and its mission is to enable consumers a free avenue to recycle products that are typically banned by municipal recycling programs. Ball point pens, contact lens containers, tooth paste tubes, and cigarette butts are just a few of the many products accepted for recycling through TerraCycle programs.

The organization partners with many large corporations, including Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, L’Oreal and Clorox, to establish recycling programs for popular products. Let’s take a look at one specific recycling program offered to get a better understanding of the free options available to consumers through TerraCycle.

The brand Burt’s Bees created a recycling program with TerraCycle to assist you with the free disposal of your empty lip balm tubes, the packaging for your favorite facial mask and the dispenser of your face moisturizer. There are several ways you can participate in the Burt’s Bees recycling program.

Public Drop Off Locations-You can drop your used Burt’s Bees products off at a participating public drop-off site. TerraCycle’s website offers a drop-off locater in which you can type in your city and find deposit locations close to you.
Become a Drop Off Location-If there are no locations in proximity to you or your town, (Burt’s Bees does not have a drop-off location in Nashville, TN, if you were wondering) you can sign up to become a public drop-off site. TerraCycle encourages participants to place their drop-off bins in areas that are highly visible in the community, like a library or grocery store. Then the bin’s address will be added to the public map on TerraCycle’s website, and your neighbors and fellow citizens can recycle their Burt’s Bees products in your bin.
Private Collector-If you want to recycle as an individual, you can create an account with TerraCycle, choose the program(s) you want to recycle with, and start collecting Burt’s Bees products on your own to send to TerraCycle for recycling.

Once public bins or your private collection boxes are full, participants can download free shipping labels and send the recyclable Burt’s Bees products to TerraCycle for processing.

TerraCycle has a wide variety of national recycling programs to choose from, and the numbers they put up are large. (Numbers pulled as of 11/16/21)

202,831,611 people participating in recycling programs.
7,762,174,415 (I assume this is pounds, although it’s not specified) waste recycled.
Over $44 million raised for charity through their recycling programs.

With over 100 participating recycling programs from some of the most recognizable brands across the globe, you could, theoretically, be sending almost all of the difficult to recycle products in your home to TerraCycle for repurposing. All for FREE. There are even options for the disposal of hazardous waste or large-scale recycling.

So, what’s the issue?

LIMITATIONS OF THE PROGRAMS

If you spend five minutes on TerraCycle’s website, you’ll make your way to a very long list of recycling programs. From Teva sandals and Swedish Fish to Arm & Hammer and Brita water pitchers, there are so many individual programs to join for all your recycling needs.

But that’s the thing—each of these products requires you to participate in a separate program. If you sign up for the Febreze Aerosol Recycling Program, you can only recycle Febreze aerosol containers in that box. No off-brands. And no mixing your Burt’s Bees recyclables with the Febreze products. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have a ton of space to create a system for 10 individualized recycling programs in my home.

Another limiting factor is the caps that are set for the free recycling programs. The corporations that work with TerraCycle budget a certain about of money for their recycling program. TerraCycle then develops an individualized program for that company with a specific number of pick-up points, be they public bins or from individuals. Once a cap is reached, it can be months before access to that particular program opens back up to consumers.

When the free programs are capped, TerraCycle does offer a paid program called the “Zero Waste Box” in which customers can purchase a receptacle of their choosing to collect recyclable waste. The most popular “Zero Waste Boxes” range in price from $86-$199, which is a far cry from TerraCycle’s claims with partnering corporations that “free” recycling is always accessible for consumers.

And we have to consider the numbers. While TerraCycle is pulling in large quantities of products to recycle each year, its barely making a dent in the overall system of possible recyclable items. For example, a Vox article cited that the organization recycled 370,000 Bic pens over the last year, which seems like a huge number. But it only accounts for 2 percent of the estimated 1.6 billion ballpoints trashed every year.

THE LAWSUIT

So how did the limitations of TerraCycle’s corporate recycling programs become the central focus of a civil lawsuit?

There is a brilliant chemical engineer named Jan Dell. In addition to an excellent name, she has sat on federal committees for climate activity and worked as a consultant for some of your favorite brands to help them reduce waste. When it comes to plastic production, Dell told these brands that while recycling is important, it cannot be THE solution to their pollution problems.

Dell, the founder of a nonprofit organization called The Last Beach Cleanup, also worked with Greenpeace to review all the material recovery facilities (MRF-plants that process recyclable waste) in the United States and see how effectively they are recycling materials. The study produced found that only #1 plastic and #2 plastic items are consistently recycled. Everything else—incinerated or shipped to a landfill.

Additionally, Dell was aware that the Federal Trade Commission has a Green Guide that outlines recycling labels can only be put on products if 60 percent of consumers in locations where the products are sold have access to a recycling site.

Armed with this information, Dell became skeptical when she started seeing products with TerraCycle recycling labels. A key motivation for corporations to develop recycling programs with TerraCycle is that they get to add a label on the packaging that their products are recyclable through TerraCycle. These labels may encourage consumers to buy specific products because they believe they can ship items to TerraCycle to recycle, for free, at any time.

Knowing the amount of waste at a typical MRF, it didn’t sit well with Dell when she saw that TerraCycle claimed to recycle up to 97 percent of “qualified materials.” She felt that was an impossible percentage to hit.

Dell reviewed TerraCycle’s recycling programs and tried to sign up for a few. Unfortunately, she found more than a dozen of programs on the organization’s site were closed to new sign ups due to the caps set by the corporations. She ended up waiting more than nine months for one of the programs to open to new participants. And that wait-time mixed with the recycling program caps gave Dell, through her nonprofit, the basis for her lawsuit.

On March 4, 2021, The Last Beach Cleanup filed a complaint against TerraCycle, Gerber Products Company, The Coca Cola Company, The Clorox Company and several other corporations for misleading consumers with recycling claims.

The complaint outlines the TerraCycle recycling labels used on products may incentivize customers to purchase one product over another, believing they can recycle that particular product for free. But the strict participation limits set for many of the TerraCycle recycling programs make it inconvenient or impossible for consumers to actually recycle the item without an added fee.

The TerraCycle recycling labels are being touted as corporate greenwashing and a tactic for companies to sell products that seem environmentally conscious without actually taking the appropriate steps to make the product easy for the consumer to recycle.

Further, the complaint calls into question TerraCycle’s recycling practices. TerraCycle has not produced any records to show the waste they collect is repurposed into other materials. (Note: This is not to say they do not have evidence to support their recycling programs. They simply have not produced any information or records at this stage of litigation.)

The lawsuit also discusses the capped/closed recycling programs lead consumers to either throw the product in the trash, where it will end up in a landfill, or they then contaminate their curbside recycling bins with items that are not accepted by municipal programs.

TerraCycle’s CEO responded, stating he disagrees with the claims listed in the complaint. He also emphasized that TerraCycle’s labels do not guarantee free recycling, and that there are always options to recycle through programs that require a fee.

THE LITE FOOT TAKEAWAY

There is so much more to unpack with this particular lawsuit, but in doing my research, I think there is one major component that Lite Foot Company, Tom Szaky, and Jan Dell can all agree upon: Single-use plastics have got to go.

Three million tons of plastic waste are produced every year, and no amount of innovative recycling programs are going to be able to handle that type of volume. So, work hard to make sustainable swaps in your home. Check out Lite Foot Company’s website for quality, eco-friendly products that can help you reduce your own personal carbon footprint.

I do legitimately think TerraCycle’s programs can be helpful, and I don’t want to completely discredit them. To reduce the number of single-use packages floating around the planet, they are currently working with major brands to create sustainable, refillable products. It’s called Loop Initiative. Check it out when you have time.

But at a higher level, it is important for TerraCycle and its corporate partners to be held accountable for how they market recycling program outcomes to consumers. They must be more open and honest with customers about what they can achieve in terms of repurposing waste. And the corporations need to be held accountable to actually look at ways they can cut back on single-use packaging instead of slapping a third party’s recycling label on a product and calling it a day.

As the TerraCycle lawsuit continues to unfold, it is my hope that the corporations not only address their misleading, greenwashing marketing tactics, but they begin to look for new avenues to provide customers with quality goods in sustainable packaging options.