What Makes CRRA
Connecticut's Recycling Leader?

CRRA has been providing Connecticut's cities and towns with recycling services since 1990.
Since then, CRRA has recycled more than 2.5 million tons of cans, bottles, paper, cardboard and other recyclables. Recycling these materials rather than disposing of them as trash
  •  prevented the creation of more than 1.5 million tons of
     greenhouse gases – we would have required more than 90
     million tree seedlings to grow for 10 years to remove the same
     amount of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere*
  •  saved more than 23 million million BTUs of energy – equivalent
      of 186 million gallons of gasoline or enough energy to power
      more than 225,000 average homes for a full year*
  •  saved its cities and towns more than $179 million in trash-disposal fees

Recycling is big business, and CRRA is a big part of that business.
A Connecticut Economic Resource Center study found that recycling accounts for more than $738 million in total economic activity and 4,790 jobs per year in Connecticut. CERC found that between 2006 and 2012 CRRA was responsible for $863 million total economic output, including 861 jobs per year.

CRRA brought electronics recycling to Connecticut in 1999.
Since then, more than 54,000 families have recycled more than 6.5 million pounds of electronics, keeping lead, mercury, zinc, cadmium and other substances from polluting our environment.

CRRA has steadily expanded its menu of recyclables:
   •  2006 – added junk mail, magazines, computer paper, catalogs
       and other types of mixed paper
   •  2007 – added boxboard, aerosol cans and oversized glass,
      plastic and metal jars and cans
   •  2010 – added all food and beverage containers made from
       plastic numbers 1 through 7

CRRA introduced single-stream recycling to its Mid-Connecticut Project communities in 2008 and to cities and towns in southwestern Connecticut in 2011.
As a result of these advancements, Mid-Connecticut Project towns have increased their recycling tonnage by more than 18 percent (see chart) while the state’s overall recycling rate has been stagnant for more than a decade.

CRRA began teaching people to recycle in 1993 and its innovative education programs are still effective today.
Since the CRRA Trash Museum opened in Hartford almost 20 years ago, more than 780,000 people have participated in its programs. In June 2012, CRRA received a CQIA Innovation Prize from the Connecticut Quality Improvement Partnership for its unique combination of processing technology, public education and recycling success. In 2002, CRRA received the Beth Brown Boettner Award for Outstanding Public Education from the National Recycling Coalition.

CRRA towns are capturing more recyclables while the USA as a whole is generating less:

That’s leadership. That’s why CRRA is Connecticut’s Recycling Leader.

(*–Information from Northeast Recycling Council’s Environmental Benefits Calculator)