Recycle Dat! New Orleans

Making Mardi Gras More Sustainable

RECYCLE DAT! is a parade recycling project working to reduce the amount of trash sent to landfills during Carnival Season. This Carnival Season, the New Orleans Office of Resilience & Sustainability is again partnering with New Orleans & Company, and Grounds Krewe, with support from sponsors like Every Can Counts, Entergy New Orleans, and Coca Cola, as well as other partners, on the Recycle Dat! initiative, promoting a more sustainable carnival season. This year's iniative is highlighted by new and expanded programming as Recycle Dat! continues to grow.

New Programming in 3rd Year of Recycle Dat!

Recycle World: Sponsored by Coca-Cola and operated by Osprey Initiative, Recycle World is a first-of-its-kind space along the parade route, providing real-time collection and sorting of plastic bottles and aluminum cans. Recycle World will highlight the packaging circularity process and the impact of recycling while contributing to a greener Mardi Gras and more sustainable celebration. The interactive station will be located at the Premium Parking lot on the corner of Louisiana and St. Charles Avenue and will be open the two Saturdays and Sundays before Mardi Gras during the route recycling hours of ~10am - 7pm. A rendering of the site is available here.

Aluminum Can Mosaic: A Masterpiece of Sustainability: Revelers and parade goers who visit Recycle World will also be able to contribute their used aluminum beverage cans to the creation of a can mosaic supported by Every Can Counts. Designed by a local artist, the mosaic will use more than 2,400 used beverage cans to reveal a Mardi-Gras themed image.

Bar Wars: New Orleans bars battle to recycle the most glass with Glass Half Full from February 1st through Mardi Gras Day, diverting waste from landfills while fueling vital coastal restoration projects. By turning glass waste into sustainable sand, Bar Wars fuels the fight to restore the coast with bold climate action and inspiring climate art projects thanks to a partnership with Climate Culture, Pursuit of Happiness Farms, and Creole Contemporary. You can support the goals of this competition by donating on behalf of your favorite competing bar at barwars.xyz

Recycling Rewards: Parade goers who turn in full bags of cans, bottles or throws at recycling stations during the route recycling program are eligible to win prizes as part of a sweepstakes from local sponsors. See all rewards and how to participate here.

Signature On-Route Parade Recycling Program Returns to Recycle Dat!

Recycling Hub Location Information
During weekend day parades, the public can recycle aluminum cans, glass and plastic bottles, as well as any unwanted parade throws, benefitting local non-profits. Staffed recycling stations along both Napoleon & St. Charles Avenue will service recycling receptacles placed along the route. Additionally, these stations will distribute crawfish sacks that can be filled with clean throws to be recycled and reused.

• The hub locations will run from approximately 10 a.m.-7 p.m. on Saturday, February 22 - “Freret Day”, Sunday, February 23, Saturday, March 1, and Sunday, March 2nd.
• There will also be a special one night route recycling shift on Muses Thursday.
• The full map is available here.
• Interested volunteers who want to help at stations staffed by Grounds Krewe, Glass Half Full, Osprey Initiative, The Green Project, and Nola Cans 4 Food should sign up here.

Disclaimer: While the Recycling Hubs will accept empty glass bottles, it's important to note that glass is not allowed on the parade route (City Ordinance Sect 54-404). We discourage parade goers from using them along the route.   

Program Impact

Last year along the parade route, the coalition recycled:

• 4,302 lbs of aluminum beverage cans
• Approximately 145,408 cans
•   4,288 lbs of glass
• 12,697 lbs of beads and throws, which includes 5,100 lbs collected at the Morial Convention Center in partnership with Realcycle and 2,144 lbs collected through the Krewe of Reuse program by Downtown Development District, French Quarter Management District, VCPORA, and Glass Half Full.
• The recycling hub run by Osprey Initiative collected plastic bottles for the first time of Recycle Dat! as a pilot run. They collected 236 lbs of plastic bottles, or approximately 6,139 bottles.

During the 2023 Carnival Season, the city recycled 1,475 pounds of aluminum, 1,500 pounds of glass and 11,535 pounds of Mardi Gras beads and throws with the help of the Recycle Dat! partners.

All empty aluminum beverage cans collected along the Uptown parade route will be processed by EMR located in Mid-City, which will pay the market rate for the cans and then the revenue generated plus a matching amount from Every Can Counts U.S. will be given to three local charities: Grow Dat Youth Farm, S.O.U.L. Nola, and T.R.E.E. Nola.

In addition to cans collected along the route, community members can also bring cans directly to EMR Mid-City to redeem the doubled amount that can either be donated to the select charities or redeemed by personal check. This program will be eligible up to the first $5,000 (separate from the route matching funds) or through March 5th, whichever comes first. Last year, during this two week doubling offer, 6,375 pounds (or 215,475 cans) were brought in directly, with nearly $5,000 paid out to participants.

Throws will also continue to be collected at select downtown hotels thanks to the French Quarter Management District and Glass Half Full. Additionally, the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center will be diverting throws recycled from krewe balls hosted on their property to local organization, ArcGNO.

KREWES EMBRACE ECO-FRIENDLY THROWS

While increasing recycling efforts is the focus of Recycle Dat!, there is increasing awareness and adoption of the use of sustainable throws.

Grounds Krewe continues to be at the forefront of Mardi Gras sustainability innovation by designing, assembling, and selling affordable, eco-friendly parade throws meant to displace imported, disposable, plastic offerings often left in the streets. Most of the throws are Louisiana products and engage local disadvantaged labor forces, and thousands of volunteers, to help produce them.

Since its inception in 2020, over 255,000 throws have been sold through the Sustainable Throw Catalog. There has been over 600 hours of paid labor to disadvantaged community members to assemble the throws with over 1,250 volunteers assisting.

In 2023, Grounds Krewe supplied sustainable throw packages to five parading Krewes including Krewe of Iris, Krewe of Themis, Krewe of Alla, Krewe of Pygmalion, and Krewe of Excalibur.