Paperboard Cartons.

Eastern Waste. management authority inc.

Liquid paperboard cartons are used worldwide for packaging milk, fruit juice, cram and custard, detergents, soups and even wine! The gable top is the most common form of these cartons and comes in many different sizes all of which are made  and recycled in basically the same way.

A very high quality white board, made of wood chip waste, is coated with a very thin layer of plastic.

Recycling Cartons.
All kerbside recycling schemes accept milk and juice cartons.   Once they reach the MRF the cartons are picked up by the sorters and collected in a large cage or hopper.  When enough have been collected to make a bale, the cartons are pushed out the bottom door of the hopper, along a conveyor belt to the bailing machine and pressed into a huge, solid bale so they can be easily transported to the paper recycling plant.

The shoalhaven Australian Paper recycling mill that your cartons are sent to is in Nowra, NSW.  There they break open the bales and check that no other materials (like plastic, aluminium or rubbish) are mixed in with the liquid paperboard, then break the cartons down to a slurry in a hydrapulper.  The plastic layers come off the cartons during this process and are removed from the  mixture when it is spun in special cone shaped drums where the heavier paper fibres spin out the bottom and the light plastic film stays high in the spinning cone.

The plastic is a waste product of carton recycling which is sent to landfill, (in some countries it is burnt for energy) and the water is recovered and re-used.

The pulp of fibres is now free of contaminants and can be pressed into paper without bleaching.  Australian paper make it into top quality recycled office paper.

There Are Many Other Ways of Recycling Cartons.
Cartons can be composted.  Under ideal conditions they should break down in about three months.

You can plant seedlings in them and the carton will break down underground as the tree grows.

Use them for craft - make pencil holders, boats, ten pin bowling (fill them with sand and stapled closed again).