PORT ANGELES — Now the city is recycling even the containers for garbage.

A city employee’s idea for recycling garbage containers has reduced the amount of solid waste that must be shipped from Port Angeles while also saving the city money.

Jason Paynter, solid waste collections supervisor, found a way to recycle plastic garbage bins that had outlived their usefulness.

About 14,000 pounds of garbage bins were hauled off in August by Denton Plastics, a recycling company in Portland., Ore., that recycles high-density polyethylene, of which city garbage bins are made.

Denton Plastics sent the city a check for $2,520. Combined with the savings of $1,031 in disposal fees, the city realized a gain of $3,551.

Now, the city solid waste crew is cleaning and storing more used garbage bins, which are destined to be transported by the recycler once there is enough to fill a semi-truck.

Paynter, who has worked for the city for nearly 14 years, had been researching a recycler for the garbage bins for about a year and a half, he said.

In 2001, the city began replacing the 300-gallon containers that had served three houses each with individual 90-gallon containers, buying about 6,000 of the smaller containers, he said.

Most garbage bins have a service life of about one decade, Paynter said.

“After 10 years, they start falling apart, especially here in the Northwest,” he said.

“The containers started breaking. We were throwing them away. No one was recycling them at the time,” he added.

The Port Angeles Regional Transfer Station at 3501 W. 18th St., which is operated by Waste Connections Inc., ships all waste to Roosevelt Landfill in eastern Washington.

“We have to ship everything out,” Paynter said. “It was a big cost to the city.”

Eventually, Paynter found and contacted Denton Plastics, which offered about 18 cents per pound for clean high-density polyethylene.

Each container weighs about 20 pounds, Paynter said.

“Once we figured we had enough for a trailer,” the firm was contacted and came to pick them up, he said.

“Now we’re piling up new ones,” Paynter said.

Recyclables are reprocessed and used in the production of new products, said Kari Martinez-Bailey, administrative assistant to the city clerk, in a news release.

“Jason’s efforts not only benefited the local environment but brought a notable economic gain to the city as well,” she said.

For more information about solid waste and recycling in the city, see http://tinyurl.com/PDN-pasolidwaste.

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Executive Editor Leah Leach can be reached at 360-417-3530 or at lleach@peninsuladailynews.com.