Try to Recycle Chip Bags? Is it Possible? Where Can I Wednesday…
The big game is right around the corner – The PUPPY BOWL! (Speaking of which, fun fact! Last year, 9 of the pups came straight from Pennsylvania SPCA shelters!) (Oh, and that other game for those football fans.) With Puppybowl and Superbowl translates into dips, appetizers and parties! And with all those dips come chips! Herr’s, Lays, Sun, Tortilla, and many other chips! Oh, chip heaven is on the way for me!
But now the green question… Can you recycle those chip bags?
The bad news is that chip bags cannot go into your single stream recycle bin, since most chip bags are made from aluminum laminated with polypropylene, also known as metalized polypropylene, or low-density polyethylene film. This basically means it’s a hot plastic and aluminum hybrid mess.
The good news is that companies are taking notice and incorporating eco-friendly tactics at the end of their product’s lives. Frito-Lay paired up with Terracycle to upcycle used chip bags to avoid a destination of the landfill. Instead, chip bags are remade into products like clipboards, tote bag or trash cans. Just collect the Frito-Lay bags and send them to Terracycle – details fully here! Plus, Frito-Lay will donate $.01 cents per bag collected to a school or nonprofit chosen by each Chip Bag Brigade!
As of 2010, Frito Lay already diverted 2 million bags form landfills. (Their products include Lay’s, Doritos, Cheetos and Fritos – obviously the 4 essential food groups!)
Participating in the TerraCycle Chip Bag Bridgade is totally free. You just have to collect bags, download a pre-paid shipping label and ship the box to TerraCycle. You can also participate in the reuse of the bag’s second lives and purchase the products. Who wouldn’t want this sexy Lay’s Messenger bag?
Otherwise, you can try to store other dry foods in the chip bags or wrap foods in the bags.
Readers, do you have any ideas to reuse or recycle used chip bags?
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Can you not recyele them with plastic bags? I figured they were similar and maybe able to put into those plastic bag recyeling bins at grocery stores.
I noticed the TerraCycle link no longer works- so what other options do we have? How about banning them, since they can’t be recycled?
Hi TooMuchPlastic – they actually do have the program still: http://www.terracycle.com/en-US/brigades/frito-lay.html. Otherwise, I don’t think they can be recycled so would go in the trash.
But who really has time for indipendent recycling plans. These companies should just make their packaging more recyclable or eco-friendly. 90 percent of the bags are still going to landfills…
toomuchplastic is correct. Your link leads to a sign that says “This program is currently closed.” You can still recycle if you spend $60-100 to purchase one of the zero-waste boxes, but most of us (myself included) are not going to pay Terra Waste to take our trash off our hands.
Unfortunately not, they are made of aluminum as well as plastic.
Hey Mike! These programs do change at times and we try our best to stay accurate. Thanks for keeping us updated! 🙂
What a great program. I did not know this existed. We were able to go online and participate. We joined a few programs. This is a great way to teach kids how to help the world. Thanks for posting this!
Terracycle brigades are closed.
made of plastic and ALUMINUM… can’t the plastic be burned off and the aluminum melted and poured back into ingots?
Those metalized chip bags and especially thise large metalized pet food bags are great stuff for making a super cheap homemade solar oven. The copenhagen design is an easy homade design for these materials. Be ready for camping, the next natural disaster or the apocalypse.
Also, with the modern day bed bug crises, great for creating extra heat for cleaning home items of bed bugs. Be careful not to overheat, though, these get hot! 150 F to 200 F is plenty even for tropical bed bugs.
I live in Australia Gold Coast, are you telling me that we do not recycle Chip packets in Austrralia.There must be a place that you can recycle soft plastic. We talk about cleaning up Australia well it is about time that the companies that package there product should be responsible to get rid of there own packaging. Or they are fined if they put packaging in land fill. I think that this would give them something to think about. So please put it to you board or to the Council for companies to take responsibility for their packaging.
The only option is not to buy chip products in this type of packaging in the first place. If you want salty snacks, buy popcorn in bulk and put your own salt and butter on it. Avoids the irresponsible chip packaging. Consumers like us turn ourselves inside out trying to figure out how to manage packaging like this when the responsibility should fall on the companies selling products in this packaging. If you don’t buy, they might get the message. Surely there are more responsible options. Vote with your feet people.
Looks like I found this site too late. Too bad…I’ve been looking for places to recycle items like potato chip bags. Now where do I go?
Thank you, Very Cool
Can’t they use alternative packaging, which are eco-friendly? Since the plastic and metal layers are hard to separate, won’t their recycling be energy consuming? So better would be to have biodegradable packaging.
Do we currently have biodegradable packaging that last long and have protective properties of the plastic packaging?
I just tested my Doritos bag in my food saver and it sealed nicely. Won’t have to buy food saver bags at the rate that I eat chips!
I agree with most comments here. Why can’t the companies provide earth-friendly packaging? I get very angry looking a these companies exploiting the earth. Most people do buy these products because of the low costs.
Terracycle’s cost of $86 for the box with the prepaid postage mail label may be prohibitive for many environmentally conscious consumers! ?.
Yes I’ve looked at Terracycle over the years and the setup seems more suitable for large groups/organizations than for individuals. The Zero Waste Boxes/envelopes are very costly for a person of modest means, and unfortunately most of the free programs are brand specific. There are only a handful of programs I can use and it would take me forever to have enough stuff to turn in; I have several donation boxes I’m trying to get out of my house as is, I really don’t want boxes of recyclables hanging around my home for months.
Someone in the reviews suggested letting people use their own boxes and just sending the shipping label to make it cheaper; that would be a great option I hope they consider. I use a program called Giveback Box that provides free shipping labels to send donations to Goodwill in your own box; not sure how they do it but hopefully Terracycle can figure something like that out.
Mailing to TerraCycle doesn’t seem eco-friendly at all, if we consider global warming as first main concern..