New E-cycling Law to Make 2013 Greener Across PA

If the holidays bring you new electronics, or if you've been keeping an old TV in the garage in the hopes that an electronics recycling event would appear, there's good news on the calendar for you—and the environment.

Pennsylvania's new Covered Device Recycling Act takes effect in January and requires the recycling of all TVs and computer equipment being discarded by households, businesses and institutions.

The law also provides free recycling for these devices being disposed of by households and businesses with fewer than 50 employees. Larger businesses are required to pay for electronics recycling.

"For the last several weeks, we have informed our customers that our collection crews will not pick up TVs and computer equipment beginning Jan. 1, 2013," said Erika Deyarmin, spokesperson for Waste Management. "We've been contacting officials in municipalities where we have hauling contracts (and) other municipal leaders and using billing notices to advise our customers of how the new law will affect their service, because we want to be a good neighbor and minimize customer inconvenience."

The "covered devices" that now must be recycled include all televisions and computer equipment, including monitors, CPUs, laptops, printers, scanners, keyboards, mouses, speakers and any other devices that connect to a computer in a home or small business.

Additional information regarding Pennsylvania's new electronics recycling law is available from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection's website.

And information about Waste Management's mail-order e-cycling services is available here.

This article originally appeared on the Canon-McMillan Patch.

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