How can we offer free Hard Drive recycling?

Back Thru The Future operates one of the largest secure hard drive destruction facilities in the country. We shred thousands of hard drives every day. We have invested in sophisticated materials sorting systems that allow us to recapture the basic material used in the manufacture of hard drives. We recycle 100% of the sorted material. While the recycling of hard drives at no cost as a stand alone business would not work, combining your drives with our secure destruction activity makes both financial and environmental sense.

Materials Found in a Hard Drive

Hard Drive Recycling Facts

• Each hard drive contains approximatly one pound of aluminum
• Recycling one hard drive saves enough energy to:
  • light a 100 watt bulb for 134 hours, or
  • run your television for 102 hours or
  • the energy equivalent of 1.5 gallons of gasoline
• Recycling aluminum is 95% more energy efficient than producing aluminum from ore
• Recycling aluminum results in 95% less air pollution and 97% less water pollution than producing aluminum from ore
  

How to ship your hard drive

The cost is small,
the environmental benefit is huge

Free Hard Drive Recycling and free CD Recycling are services offered by Back Thru The Future Technology Disposal, to consumers with a desire to improve their environmental footprint. Hard drives and CDs are made of high value recyclable material - aluminum and polycarbonate plastic respectively. The recycling of hard drives and CDs saves substantial amounts of energy and prevents significant amounts of both air and water pollution attributed to the manufacturing of these items from virgin material.

CD/DVD Recycling Facts

• A CD/DVD is considered a class 7 recyclable plastic
• To manufacture a pound of plastic (30 cds per pound), it requires 300 cubic feet of natural gas, 2 cups of crude oil and 24 gallons of water
• It is estimated that AOL alone has distributed more than 2 billion CDs. That is the natural gas equivalent of heating 200,000 homes for 1 year
• It is estimated that it will take over 1 million years for a CD to completely decompose in a landfill