The Emerald Coast Utilities Authority (ECUA) was pleased to collaborate with the Pensacola and Perdido Bays Estuary Program (PPBEP) on a recycling education campaign in 2023. This campaign features a newly updated sticker design, which highlights current recycling best practices and is being affixed to residential recycling can lids as new cans are distributed to ECUA customers.

The initiative was funded through an Environmental Protection Agency Trash Free Waters grant that PPBEP received to reduce litter in three local creeks across the Pensacola Bay Watershed. PPBEP’s mission is to restore and protect the Pensacola and Perdido Bay Watersheds through restoration, education, and monitoring. Dedicated volunteers monitored litter in Carpenter, Jones, and Pond Creeks for over two years and determined that plastic was the most commonly found item in these waterways. Preventive measures, such as proper disposal of litter and recyclable materials, can help protect our waterways, storm drains, and wildlife from the impacts of this litter.

ECUA provides residential curbside sanitation service to all the unincorporated parts of Escambia County (excluding only the City of Pensacola and the Town of Century) and its recycling program is entirely voluntary although residents are encouraged to participate! Keeping our recycling clean and free of household garbage is of the utmost importance as the quality of the recyclables affects ECUA’s ability to sell recycling as a commodity for remanufacturing into new materials. The new lid stickers illustrate what can be recycled at the ECUA’s Material Recycling Facility (MRF) -- cardboard and mixed paper (like junk mail), metal food and beverage cans, glass jars and bottles, and plastic containers bearing the #1 or #2 symbol.

For more information about local recycling guidelines, please download the Recycle Coach App or visit ECUA’s website at ecua.fl.gov.

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Contact Information:

Emerald Coast Utilities Authority
Sigrid Rehrig, Education Programs Specialist
850-969-3348
Sigrid.Rehrig@ecua.fl.gov

Pensacola and Perdido Bays Estuary Program
Logan McDonald, Community Outreach Coordinator
850-595-1479
lmcdonald@ppbep.org