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Materials / Plastic bottles and jugs

Plastic bottles and jugs

PET confirmedHDPE accumulating

#1 bottles were sold to a real buyer in 2023: 17 tons for $1,160. #2 jugs shipped nothing that year, probably stockpiled.

Where it goes

Bin
#1 (PET) and #2 (HDPE) bottles and jugs only. Nothing else.
Town data
Recycling center
Sorted by resin. PET and HDPE melt differently and sell to different buyers.
Background
Sold to Casella
PET: 17 tons for $1,160.25 in 2023. The town is under contract with Casella for everything from the drop-off windows, per the manager.
Manager, in person
HDPE
Zero tons shipped in 2023. Per the manager, jugs are packed and held until a pickup makes sense; the next shipment will show in the 2026-27 reporting.
Manager, in person

Solid border: confirmed. Dashed: likely. Dotted: open.

The numbers

PET, 2023
17 tons, $1,160.25, about $68 per ton Town data
HDPE, 2023
0 tons shipped, $0 Town data
PET and HDPE, 2024
None shipped Town data
Everything else
Plastics #3 through #7 aren't collected. Film has its own stream. Town data
National context
Under 10% of plastic gets recycled in the United States. Background
Styrofoam, since Dec 27, 2024
Collected separately and trucked to the Gilford, NH transfer station, the state's foam hub, where a Foam Cycle densifier chops and heats it into dense polystyrene ingots sold for picture frames and moldings Town data

What the records show

The center takes #1 and #2 bottles and jugs and nothing else. That narrow list is the point. PET, the #1 resin in soda and water bottles, and HDPE, the #2 resin in milk jugs and detergent bottles, are chemically different, melt differently, and sell as separate commodities to different buyers. HDPE often splits again into natural, which is worth more, and colored.

In 2023 the town sold 17 tons of PET for $1,160.25. The buyer is Casella. The town is under contract with Casella for everything that goes into the drop-off windows: paper, cardboard, bottles and jugs, cans, and newspaper, per the center manager. Casella runs materials recovery facilities in Rutland, Vermont and Charlestown, Massachusetts; which one takes Peterborough's bales isn't known.

HDPE shipped zero tons that year despite being collected. The manager's explanation, September 2026: jugs and cans are packed and held until there's enough for a pickup to make sense, and the next shipment will show up in the 2026-27 reporting. Neither PET nor HDPE shipped in 2024 either. A new storage building went up that year so material can be held for better prices.

The national picture is bleak and this site won't pretend otherwise. Under 10% of plastic gets recycled in the United States, and mixed #3 through #7 collection was always closer to fiction than recycling. Here, anything that isn't a bottle or a jug doesn't get recycled, with two exceptions: film, which has its own stream and its own page, and foam.

Styrofoam is the newest stream. Since December 27, 2024 the center takes #6 foam (coolers, meat and produce trays, egg cartons, packing blocks, clamshells) and trucks it to the Gilford Solid Waste Center, New Hampshire's first foam recycling hub. Gilford runs a Foam Cycle densifier that chops the foam, heats it, and squeezes the air out, about 90 to 1, into dense polystyrene ingots that manufacturers buy for picture frames, interior moldings, and insulation. It's a town-to-town arrangement set up with the Recycling Committee, separate from the Casella contract. Whether Peterborough pays Gilford, shares in the ingot revenue, or just delivers is an open question.

Still open

Tracked on the open questions page.

Sources

← GlassPlastic film →