IBC tote recycling

What a tote is made of

A caged composite IBC is three materials in one. The bottle is high-density polyethylene, usually translucent. The cage is a welded grid of galvanized steel tube. The base is steel, a composite or, on older units, wood. Each part has a different recycling stream, and the easiest loads are the ones where the parts have been separated before they leave the yard.

What recyclers want

A recycler wants a clean, dry, sorted stream. Plastics with a heavy residue are rejected because the contamination ruins a batch. Steel with plastic still attached is discounted. A load that has been drained, with caps off and bottles removed from cages, is accepted more readily and at a better rate than a load of intact dirty totes.

A bottle that held a regulated product has to be empty under federal rules before it goes anywhere. See our guide to the empty-container rule.

Which totes go straight to the recycler

• Cracked or punctured bottles that cannot hold liquid.
• Crushed or bent cages that fail a visual inspection.
• Brittle old bottles that are sun-chalked and fissured.
• Totes with a smell no rinse will remove.
• Surplus stacks that nobody has asked for in a year.

A tote with a good cage and a bad bottle is a different case. The cage has value as a rebuilding frame, and a reconditioner may take it.

Florida's sun and the plastic

Ultraviolet light shortens the life of polyethylene. A bottle that sat uncovered in Miami sun for a few years will chalk, craze and eventually crack under a modest load. If you hold stock, shade it. If you are clearing old stock, expect more of it to go to the recycler than you hoped.

How to prepare a recycling load

Empty each bottle completely, let it drain with the valve open and the cap off, and rinse if the last contents allow it. Separate the bottle from the cage if you have the tools and the time; otherwise leave them together and say so. Remove loose labels, leave the plates on, and stack cages flat on a pallet, strapped, with the bottles bagged or bundled separately. A recycler can tell in a moment whether a load has been prepared, and prices the load accordingly.

Price and paperwork

We do not post a price or a pickup date, because the market for scrap plastic and steel moves, and the value of a load depends on its cleanliness and its sort. What we can say is what raises or lowers it. A separated load is worth more than a mixed one. A rinsed bottle is worth more than a dirty one. A galvanized cage with no plastic attached sells as clean steel. Bottles with caps and valves removed sell as clean plastic. A weigh ticket from the recycler is the receipt; keep it with your records. If you are a business, ask the recycler for a certificate or a letter that confirms the material was received and what happens to it, which helps with sustainability reporting and, if the tote held a regulated product, with the paper trail.

Describing the load

Before you write, clear the path to the stack, set aside anything that is not a tote, and put caps and valves in a bucket. Say whether the totes are stacked on pallets or nested loose, and note the gate width. A load sheet that states the count, the size and the last contents of each group is what lets us reply with a grade and a path. Keep a copy for your own records, which is useful if a landlord or a property manager asks later.

What recyclers usually refuse

Recyclers commonly refuse totes that held hazardous material, bottles with a heavy residue, cages full of non-metal junk and mixed loads that arrive without sorting. Call ahead, describe the load, and ask what the facility wants before the truck leaves.

Why reuse sometimes beats recycling

A sound tote has years of use left, and sending it to be ground into pellets wastes that. If the bottle holds water and the cage is straight, ask whether we or a neighbor could use it before you scrap it. Recycling is for the tote that has finished its working life.

Keeping the stream clean

The simplest way to keep a recycling stream clean is to keep one product per tote and to drain it fully before storing. Write the last contents on the cage with a marker and keep the plate legible. A recycler that can see what a bottle held decides faster, and a tote with a known history is easier to place than one with none.