RecycleForCalifornia.com Announces Successful Start of Operations
FOLSOM, Calif. — RecycleForCalifornia.com, an industry-funded statewide cell phone recycling initiative, processed more than 1,000 old cell phones in its first week of operation.
More than 150 businesses, municipalities and non-profit organizations have signed up to participate in the program since it was launched on Earth Day, April 22. The program collects old cell phones from consumers and program participants throughout the state. Phones are then reused or recycled in an environmentally responsible manner.
The RecycleForCalifornia.com Web site offers a channel through which individuals and organizations can turn in old cell phones to help keep toxins and hazardous chemicals out of the environment. Additionally, some phones have a re-marketable value so RecycleForCalifornia.com will pay for these handsets. Everyone in the state of California can participate.
Individual consumers can sell their cell phones for cash; non-profit organizations, businesses and city, county and state government agencies can collect old cell phones from their members, customers, employees, residents or organizations. All program materials and shipping are free to collecting organizations, and all cell phones are accepted. Cell phones that cannot be reused are recycled, with no hazardous materials entering landfills.
“RecycleForCalifornia.com offers a great opportunity for individuals and organizations of all kinds to conform to the new California laws and keep environmentally damaging cell phones out of landfills while generating revenue for important programs throughout the state,” said Conrad Melancon, program director. “Many of these phones will be sent overseas to countries where a cellular phone may be the only means of long distance communications, and others will be used for emergency services and given to shelters throughout the U.S.”
RecycleForCalifornia.com was established in response to a law passed by the California Legislature in 2004 that requires cell phone retailers to have no-cost take-back and recycling programs in place by 2006. It is estimated there are more than 500 million used cellular phones in the U.S. About 100 million more are expected to be replaced this year.
RecycleForCalifornia.com is funded and operated by Florida-base RMS Communications Group Inc. RMS has been in the wireless industry since 1985 and specializes in developing and implementing innovative programs enabling consumers, businesses, non-profits and government agencies to participate in helping the environment and raise funds by collecting old cell phones.
Visit RecycleForCalifornia.com at www.recycleforcalifornia.com.
This article originally appeared in the July 2005 issue of Recharger.