Reconnect Recycling Network Expands

With 100 sites recently added, the green partnership between Dell and Goodwill now claims to cover 42 million people.Reconnect sites are Goodwill locations where you can dispose of old electronics, for free, knowing they will be recycled responsibly and not shipped off to a Third World site for dismantling. Reconnect is operated in partnership with Dell, with Microsoft participation. The service is aimed at consumers, but small businessmen also use them. They will take any brand of computer, working or not, and nearly anything that can be attached to a computer.

The new sites are in Delaware, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island, and bring the network up to 2,200 total sites.

Their coverage map shows a solid presence from Michigan to Texas and then west to San Diego. Most of the East Coast and eastern Canada is also covered, as is the Oregon region. But, weirdly, most of California is not covered.

But there are other alternatives for small-scale recycling. You can go to Staples, which will recycle Dell items for free, and other office electronics for a fee. Best Buy will take individual computers, but they want the hard drives removed. Office Depot recycles by the unsealed box-load, and sells those boxes for either $5, $10, or $15.