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Smoking is banned on the beach in Maryland and Delaware. It鈥檚 also banned inside restaurants and bars at the beaches. But if you look around on the streets and sidewalks, or at the entrances to the beach, you鈥檒l still see tons of cigarette butts.
It鈥檚 one of 鈥� if not the 鈥� leading pieces of litter collected off the street every year, and a big reason why smoking was eventually banned on the beaches. People didn鈥檛 want to stretch out on sand that was also used as an ashtray.
But now Ocean City is finding a new use for all that trash on the ground. It turns out cigarette butts are recyclable. And dozens of metal boxes and tubes have been set up outside of restaurants and bars, condos and other shops up and down Ocean City that are just for cigarette butts.
They鈥檙e dubbed 鈥渂utt huts鈥� by some, and they鈥檙e only about a foot tall and maybe 6 inches wide. The opening is small enough for the butts, but make it harder for other litter to get mixed in.
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鈥淲e provide them to any business or organization that would like them as long as they commit to recycling their butts,鈥� said Sandi Smith, a development and marketing coordinator for the , a nonprofit environmental group whose goal is protecting the inland bays along Maryland鈥檚 coast.
The butt huts, which is also called a 鈥渃igarette butler,鈥� will be marked with signs next to them, since on their own they might not always stand out. Some of them do have fancier illustrations courtesy of a local artist who teamed up with the Coastal Bays program.
You might be asking 鈥渨hat do they do with cigarette butts,鈥� Smith asked, rhetorically. 鈥淲ell, they make benches out of them.鈥�
See the benches made from recycled cigarette butts (PDF)
Each of those butt huts can hold about a thousand used up cigarette butts. Inside those filters is a piece of plastic that a New Jersey-based , which specializes in reusing hard to recycle materials, then collects. They also build trash cans, Adirondack chairs, and even loading pallets out of the cigarette butts.
Smith said it takes some 60,000 recycled cigarette butts to make one bench.
鈥淲e always tell people, ‘If you want to see the impact of butts on a community, even in the city, next time you鈥檙e at a streetlight, just look down on the corner,鈥� Smith said. 鈥淔or some reason, it just seems like when you鈥檙e at the stoplight, that鈥檚 where you tend to flick your butt out the window.鈥�
The businesses allowing the butt huts to be set up on their property really don鈥檛 have to do anything else aside from emptying them into a plastic bag that鈥檒l get collected by someone else, who will then get them shipped up to New Jersey for recycling.
鈥淲e鈥檙e really encouraging people to use them,鈥� Ocean City Mayor Rick Meehan said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 a universal issue, and when you go out on the beach, it鈥檚 kind of disheartening as you put your feet or hands in the sand as you run across if you run across cigarette butts.鈥�
鈥淚t鈥檚 an environmental concern,鈥� he added. 鈥淭hey do not decompose.鈥�
The Coastal Bays Program teamed up with the Town of Ocean City and the Ocean City chapter of the Surfrider Foundation to launch the program, using what鈥檚 essentially a grant from Keep America Beautiful, which helped provide the receptacles.
And while they鈥檙e not up yet, Smith said the Coastal Bays program has already ordered a couple of benches made from recycled cigarette butts to show off.
They鈥檙e scheduled to arrive sometime in July, which means this summer 鈥渨hen people are walking around,鈥� said Smith, 鈥測ou can put your butt on butts.鈥�
Pun was most definitely intended.
