CD Recycling in Canberra and NSW
Canberra has a great recycling setup – once a fortnight they collect the recycling bin that can take a pretty wide range of materials. But I wasn’t sure what to do with my growing collection of useless CDs.
I’m not alone in this – the web abounds with people proposing various ways of re-using old CDs as people find their collection of CDs from magazine covers, newspapers, misburnt personal CDs, old music, etc growing and growing. Some of these ideas are pretty neat – and re-use is always better than recycling – but I have a lot of old CDs! 
So I sent an email off to my local government asking if I could put CDs in my recycle bin. Within 24 hours they’d responded. Unfortunately, no, local facilities couldn’t handle them (with a good technical explanation of why), and links to some other facilities that might be relevant.
A quick aside here to congratulate the ACT NOWaste program – emails to government can go unanswered for weeks before an off-topic, form-letter reply is sent. It was great to get such a quick response that was so helpful.
Their response suggested the following two facilities:
- CD ROM Services – they have a CD destruction service which includes recycling. They use Australian Plastics Reprocessing as the processor.
- Australian Plastics Reprocessing also offer a service – they prefer commercial quantities, but apparently accept smaller amounts. The link provided is to a NSW government web page discussing various recycling providers
I haven’t tried either of these services yet, but hopefully its a good starting to point for people looking into CD recycling in the region.
UPDATE 17 May 2011: CD ROM Services have provided the following update:
1. If you have a larger quantity, (over 1 box), don’t waste resources by first sending to CD-ROM Services but rather send directly to Australian Plastics Reprocessing, at 7 Benley St, Wetherill Park, NSW 2164.
2. Be sensible. Don’t waste fuel, post or courier resources sending discs. Rather drop them off when passing by yourself, or when you have another delivery to North Sydney or Wetherill Park.
Categories: environment, green, recycle
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October 30th, 2007 at 2:30 pm
Ausmag media provide CD recycling service, free of charge, just send your un-wanted CD disc to our warehouse at seven hills nsw.
visit our websit to find out more information
February 18th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I have found a CD recycling program called Ecodisc operating in NSW…they accepted a small quantity of CDs that I didn’t want to throw in the trash…their website is http://www.discstation.com.au