It’s easy enough to put out recyclable paper, glass, plastic and aluminum for curbside pickup.
But what about all that other discarded stuff around the house — dead batteries, old cellphones, computers, food packaging and other clutter?
With Earth Day coming up on Wednesday, here’s a list of recycling programs to help manage unwanted stuff:
Batteries can be recycled for free at . This includes rechargeable batteries, car batteries and uninterruptible-power-supply batteries, but not alkalines.
Cellphones are recycled at AT&T stores. That company sponsors the Cell Phones for Soldiers program. Motorola also takes old cells (motorola.com/ recycle). And they can be dropped off at Ace Hardware, which participates in the Call2Recycle program, which means that compact fluorescent light bulbs, mercury-containing thermostats and incandescent light strands like Christmas lights can also be recycled at Ace stores.
Computers can be dropped off .
Electronics and the rechargeable batteries many of them run on are accepted by Call2Recycle stores. These include Radio Shack, The Home Depot, Lowe’s and Target.
Elmer’s brand glue sticks and bottles can be recycled at Wal-Mart, but only by schools that register at .
Food packaging including cookie wrappers, drink pouches, potato chip bags, yogurt containers, wine bottle corks and cereal boxes are repurposed by TerraCycle (terracycle.net).
Hard drives from old computers are recycled for a small fee by Back Thru the Future, which also accepts CDs and DVDs for free, and arranges large- scale business recycling. E-mail recycle@backthruthefuture.com for details. CDs are also accepted .
Printer cartridges and toner are accepted at locations.
“Technotrash” including jewel cases, pagers, PDAs, chargers, cables, headsets, MP3 players, digital cameras, hand-held games and an array of other geeky stuff is recycled for a fee by GreenDisk (greendisk.com).
Tell us what else can be recycled and where: .
