Thornton and Commerce City, along with the city of Longmont, were selected for Recycle Colorado’s six-month recycling education campaign, intending to increase recycling collection throughout the state. The campaign includes videos and billboards advertising recycling and targeted recycling information from search results in Google and third-party websites. “How can we motivate residents to recycle more?” said Laura Levesque, Recycle Colorado programs director. “One popular hypothesis is that consistent visual reminders could prompt us to recycle more and recycle better.”
Every month of the campaign focuses on a different recycling topic, including how recycled materials are made into new products and how recycling can create jobs. According to a November report, Colorado recycles significantly less than the country on average. Currently, Colorado recycles and composts less than 16% of annual municipal waste, less than half of the 35% national average.
The state’s recycling rates have even been decreasing in recent years, dropping from 17.2% to 15.9% in 2019. Targeting Front Range cities like Longmont, Thornton and Commerce City is important as Front Range communities collectively produce about 87% of the state’s waste, the report said.