Two-and-a-half ounces of oil are used in every inkjet cartridge made. 86 percent -- more than 105 million -- of all empty inkjet cartridges in the United States are thrown away annually. And 97 million cell phones are trashed each year.

You can help save the environment. It's easy and it's free. The District and Office Depot have established a recycling program for used inkjet cartridges, laser cartridges, copier toner cartridges and old personal cell phones. (Do not dispose of District cell phones through this program; send them to Steve Schmidt in Plant Services.)

Office Depot has provided District Purchasing Services with prepaid plastic mailing envelopes and cardboard collection containers for the cartridges. Contact Tom Lindstrom (lindstromtom@fhda.edu) or Linda Mahi @ ext. 6193 in Purchasing Services to request the mailing containers. Or you can order your own free supply of these envelopes and containers by following the instructions on the Cyberwaste Recycling Form, available as a Word document download.

You may either mail the containers at no charge, or give them to the Office Depot driver when your office supply order is delivered. You may also give the Office Depot driver the laser cartridges and copier toner cartridges in the containers that they originally came in. Just label them to Office Depot as items to be recycled. They will also pick up your old personal cell phones.

To order your own supply of recycling containers, download the Cyberwaste Recycling Form from the ETS website.

We encourage you to try Office Depot's recycled ink and toner cartridges as well. Office Depot offers many environmentally preferable products. They are shown online as well as in a catalog called "The Green Book." You may order this catalog with your next supply order or online. If you want it as part of your next order, the order number is 321464.

If you have questions about this program or if you need an Office Depot online account, please contact District Purchasing Services, Tom Lindstrom, ext. 6167, or lindstromtom@fhda.edu.