Lori Laporte is trying to beautify her parking lot.
The owner of Laporte’s Nursery and Greenhouses has erected a receptacle on a fence post at the entrance of the retail store on Lakeshore Drive.
“You should see the cigarette butts that we pick up,” Laporte told The Nugget Wednesday.
The gardener was told about a new idea from TerraCycle that recycles cigarette butts.
“We’re all about saving the environment and keeping our planet clean, green and beautiful,” Laporte said. “So this was just a natural fit.”
The unit was installed a few weeks ago, however Laporte has already noticed a huge difference in the amount of cigarette butts she has to pick up.
“Cigarette butts don’t break down, that’s why you see them everywhere. Once the receptacle is full, we call TerraCycle and they send us a bag to dump the cigarette butts in. We ship them back to the company and they recycle the filters and compost the tobacco.”
Laporte said the City of Kingston is doing a trial run with them to see how effective they are.