weight of soda can(aluminum)

15 grams, measured with a digital postal scale.

Talofa,

thanks for the info, will look into it..

Approximately 21 cans to one US pound.

I recommend to weight the can by your self using digital and sensitive postal scale to find the actual weight of aluminium located at the can.

Well put my deep thinking friend.

Mike

1st. Weight it! If there are variations in size make statistic samples of 100 pieces and weight then divide by 100 (that specially go for plastic)

2nd. ASK factory!

3rd. You would have to ask how much factory that produces aluminium sheets would pay You for pressed m3 of cans, then deduct costs of colecting, transporting and pressing cans, and cost of sending this to factory. Difference is Your profit,( if any, but there should be in case of aluminium cans, but if You dont make profit on plastic, or even lose money, than You have to factor that in where there IS profit ), so You see what incentive You can give to citizens for bringing it to collection place or device. I would advise that You split profit equally with people, that way they would surely have interes to collect cans for You, and keep in mind that it cost them also time and effort, and perhaps also they spend some money on transport........ In such case they would tend to acumulate cans and bring bigger batches, therefore dont restrict number of cans or bottles that would be accepted at collection point, and keep in mind that poor people and students would collect them in much bigger quantity than average.

4th. Automats for this cost money to purchase, spend electricity, require filling with small coins and maintenance, AND this all eats profit, no? One answer is to make deals with shops that sell goods in such packages (cans and plastic, both) to collect this for You, as You need not hire people nor storage space because they have them allready. But then, You have to give incentive to THEM, also! In this case You can save money for transporting cans and storing pressed cans by having special truck(s) that have hydraulic press and crane arm for lifting pressed cans on the back of truck, so when truck is filled up it can go to railway station or to factory that would buy this directly, thus saving on transport costs. In my country there is factory which produce such trucks, but also containers of specialized use. If You make me representative of Your company, I could negotiate prices with factory, but You should know how many trucks You would need. My fee would be 1% of originall factory price before I negotiate discount, at least in size of 5%.......

Hope that You would find my answer usefull and hire me :-))

Regards from Zagreb, the capitol of Croatia, Europe!

Marijan Pollak

Hi Tama,

Just weigh the damned things, it is as easy as that!

Spencer.

Many people feels soda cans are aluminium. Here in Canada they are one piece steel bottom cup with an aluminium cap and captive pull opener. This reduces their scrap value greatly

Hi,

Try the unconventional way!

Fill the can with water. Weigh it with a good scale. Say weight is X gms. Taking care not to spill any, empty the can filling in a measuring cylinder and measure the volume in cubic centimeters. Say it is Y.

weight of the can is !Y-X!

Repeat several times to get an average.

Have fun...

Here in Toronto(Ontario, Canada) they have implemented a wine bottle deposit of 20 cents and they get about 70% of bottles returned. They pay the Beer shops (who have been recycling beer cans and bottles for decades) to do it.

The idea is good, but there is a limit to how far you can go. If you put a 20 cent deposit on allpackaging, crisps packets, jam jars etc, you would create a huge logistics problem with the grocers who charged this fee and who were then forced to count them and return the deposit and store the empties (possibly compressed/crushed?). I would like them to move in this direction over time and subsidize the system to make it work and gradually make the makers and consumers bear the costs, albeit in a different way than they do now.

I grew up in Massachusetts, one of the first to implement the "Bottle Bill" back in the 70's which put a nickel deposit on most bottled and canned beverages (except milk, water, fruit juice etc.) What a pain for the consumer and the retail stores. Forced ($) recycling really leaves a foul taste in the mouth. Initially, the bottlers fought tooth and nail to prevent it from happening, but funny thing, after it was implemented, they found it increased their profits from the unredeemed containers and now I believe they would fight its repeal. The robber barons in the State House made sure their friends in the bottling business got their share.

The initial push back then was not recycling, but roadside litter. After the passage of the bottle bill, people would canvass roadways looking for the beer cans and bottles tossed because of "open container" laws (unintended consequence). But now that we have this "Bottle Bill", there are homeless people who dump out trash cans looking for those nickel deposits resulting in even more litter in certain areas (another unintended consequence) and in effect causing the very problem it was purported to solve in the first place. Ugh.

Much better is to have consumer friendly recycling like we have in my current location (Anne Arundel County, Maryland) where the county picks up recyclables at the curb once a week with no sorting required.

http://www.recyclemoreoften.com/

They provide free recycling bins. A centralized sorting facility performs the sorting at an efficient economy of scale using largely automated processes and machines. The county receives additional revenues from the sale of the paper, plastics, steel and aluminum and this also extends the life of the county landfill further reducing long term capital expenses. This is the way it should be in populated areas.

In comparison, in rural areas with low population densities, it is probably not "green" to recycle because the resource and environmental impact of collection, processing, and transportation are greater than the benefits achieved. For instance, in rural New Hampshire where my parents live, they process the aluminum and plastics but the all the glass is simply crushed and added to the aggregate of concrete used to form culverts because the weight of the glass makes it cost prohibitive to transport considering the value of the scrap glass.

Each jurisdiction needs to evaluate the efficacy of recycling based upon their specific circumstances. One size does not fit all. Give people the flexibility to come up with imaginative local solutions that works for them and the environment.

yes, The law of unintended consequences is strong indeed. With RFID cheap enough, you could track each can, who bought it, etc, and trash cans could have readers that count it and credit your account for the deposit. And if the police picked up a soda can from the roadside their reader would ID Brave Sir Robin and impose a $25 fine for littering. Why stop there...