Anyone who’s driven along West Street in the past three months may have noticed Pahrump’s newest neighborhood recycling center.
Located at 741 West St., the modest facility allows residents to drop off recyclable materials.
The center is the brainchild of Vic Bitar, founder and owner of Nature Restorer, Inc.
This week, Bitar said he envisions a world in which plastics play a large role that enhances the standard of living for all humanity, and where all plastic wastes are recovered in an environmentally sound manner.
Nature Restorer, Inc. is also a nonprofit company.
“Our company’s mission is to seek to achieve educating the public at large and innovating to facilitate the efficient and productive collection and recovery of plastic waste,” he said.
Bitar said he wanted to make dropping off recyclables as convenient as possible for area residents.
The goal, he said, is to reduce the amount of plastic waste in the community.
“This is what is called a neighborhood recycling center and there will be more of them around town eventually,” he said. “People can just drive right up and dispose of their plastics. They can sort it out if they wish or they can just drop it off in a big bag. This is our first neighborhood recycling rack in Pahrump and it went up about three months ago at this location.”
Bitar said virtually any kind of plastic can be recycled, as well as Styrofoam.
“It goes into processing to make new plastic products,” he said. “Things like water and soda bottles and things of that nature can be turned right back to the manufacturer after it’s been grounded up, cleaned and pelletized. It goes back to the manufacturer to make new plastics.”
Additionally, Bitar said the sole purpose of the center is to help clean up the community and outlying areas of disposed materials.
He noted that during a recent trip into the desert, he continually saw plastics and Styrofoam strewn as far as the eye could see.
“People just throw trash out their windows,” he said. “It’s sad because we were just out there and we actually picked up about two or three bags full of plastics and trash. Unfortunately, a lot of the plastic goes into landfills and it sits there for 50 to 60 years before it begins to break down. I think the new center is a very convenient location for the community and we have regular folks who come by every day and drop off their recyclables.”
The neighborhood recycling center is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
“People can also drop off aluminum cans, which is a separate entity and the money that we generate from the cans is used for the town’s disadvantaged.”
Contact reporter Selwyn Harris at sharris@pvtimes.com. On Twitter: @pvtimes