Why was the Clean Air Act enacted? The primary reason for its endorsement is to curb air-pollution and provide a cleaner air. Each one of us can help in the drive for a cleaner environment. If driving a car, see to it that it is fine tuned always to reduce the emission of harmful substances. Now for some of us who are laser printer users, recycling empty OEM toner cartridges is a sure way of reducing air-pollution. Recycling delays the disposal of empty cartridges into landfills and dumpsites. At the same time, recycling minimizes the manufacture of toner cartridges that pumps CO2 (carbon dioxide) into the atmosphere during the production process. The vicious cycle that ultimately harms the environment can be minimized if each one of us contributes in a little way.
How large is the contribution of OEM toner cartridges to air pollution? The manufacture of 100 OEM toner cartridges can generate a ton of CO2; roughly the volume of pollutants pumped by a Boeing 747 in its extended flight to Manila, the Philippines from Los Angeles, California 7,307 miles away. The United States alone discards 110 million OEM toner cartridges annually – equivalent to over 1 million tons of CO2 that pollute our air-environment. And to think that only about 10 million OEM toner cartridges are recycled annually, the ease out of CO2 pollution generated by the printing industry is still a long tedious process.
Did you know that you can reuse empty toner cartridges for another printing cycle? Recycle. Refill. Save! has got you covered on the basics of toner cartridge recycling.
Hewlett Packard, the biggest printer manufacturer, likewise delivers the most number of discarded OEM cartridges. The CC364A/X cartridge of the HP P4015 is one good example. If the user can perform multiple refills using compatible toner (up to 3 refills as recommended) on the empty cartridge, the unit’s capacity could reach almost 100,000 pages, way above its 24,000 pages rating at 5% page coverage. This gives users substantial print savings because the equivalent toner refill kit is sold for only $35.95 including the reset chip. With the use of the refill kit, the user has delayed the disposal of the cartridge 4 times over; notwithstanding its effect on cartridge manufacturing and disposal. If say 100 users of the HP CC364A cartridge decide to use toner refill kits, said act would translate to the reduced production of about 400 toner cartridges annually and around 4 tons of CO2 prevented from hitting the atmosphere.
At the end of the day, what the toner refill kit user enjoys are all the plus factors to laser printing savings on printing expenses, OEM quality prints and yield and reduced e-garbage while lending a hand to the implementation of the Clean Air Act.
