Safe and Environmentally Friendly Ways to Dispose of Paint

On average, two gallons of house hold paint is sold to each person in the USA yearly. But if we don't dispose of the paint after we use it properly, the effects could seriously effect the environment.For example,  if you dump extra paint into a sewer the chemicals from the paint could get into the sewage treatment systems, possibly getting into our drinking water.

One more reason to dispose of paint properly is that it can harm nearby wildlife. An example would be a person dumping paint in their backyard. The paint would seep into the ground and contaminate the ground water. That ground water would flow into a body of water, making the fish sick and any other animals that consume that fish or drinks the water.

There many simple ways we can prevent paint from becoming a source of pollution to earth. We can keep the remains of the paint in storage, use all of it during the time that we bought it (E.g: doing a double layer if painting walls), and only buy what you need (measure the area you are going to paint).

Another way to dispose of paint safely and responsibly is to bring the reminants of the paint to a reblending facility. These programs mix your used paint with other colours in the same family (E.g: reds would be mixed with other warm colours like orange) and then they re-sell them again.

So, in conclusion, if we don't dispose of paint properly it can affect our sewge treatment systems and make our environment sick. Things we can do to prevent this from becoming a source of pollution are storing the exces paint, using all the paint in one sitting, only buying what you need and bringing extra paint to reblending facilities.

Submitted by Ashley B.

Seperating Mixtures: Safe and Environmentally Friendly ways to Dispose of Paint

Bibliographyhttps://www.livgov.com/dpw/Pages/latex_paint_disposal.aspxhttp://www.hercenter.org/facilitiesandgrounds/paints.cfm