Plastic Bottle Caps
In Winneshiek County, we ask that you remove bottle caps when you recycle your plastic containers. There are two reasons for this:
- Removing the cap allows the bottles to be compressed more when they are baled. This allows more plastic to be transported in one load.
- Plastic caps typically do not contain a number. If they do, they are usually greater than #2 which means we can’t recycle them in Winneshiek County. At this time, the county only accepts plastics stamped #1 and #2.
Metal Bottle Caps
Metal bottle caps can be recycled if you take the proper steps:
- Separate your bottle caps into empty aluminum and steel cans. If the cap sticks to a magnet, it’s steel. If not, then it’s aluminum.
- Place the steel caps in the steel can and aluminum caps in the aluminum can.
- Once the containers are halfway full with caps, crimp the cans closed so the caps don’t fall out when they are processed.
Loose metal caps that are thrown into the recycling bin are less likely to be recycled because they are often too small to be identified. As a result, they fall through the screeners in the sorting process and end up going to the landfill.