San Francisco’s recycling company, Recology, is picking up Christmas trees from residences in order to convert the woody bio mass into Biofuel.  Between January 2-6 and Jauary. 9-13, San Francisco residents can place their Christmas tree next to their curbside waste on their normal pick up day before 6 a.m. and Recology will pick them up, turn them into wood chips and sell them to local facilities who convert the chips into fuel.  Trees need to be free of decorations and man-made materials.This is a great way to dispose of your tree.  I know when I was growing up, most people just brought their tree to Ocean Beach and had a huge bonfire.  Which is fun, but puts all that carbon in the air without converting any of that heat into usable energy.  There are wood mass power plants that specialize in converting bio mass into electricity so it makes sense that these trees should end up there.  Plus the money made in selling the wood chips to those facilities will be reinvested into San Francisco’s recycling program.

Sure, if San Francisco wanted to be completely sustainable, they would only sell Christmas trees that were indigenous to the area, use them for a week during Christmas, then re plant them back into the ground.  But, everyone wants that nice smelling tree that comes form the mountains. So the next best thing is to give your used tree to Recology who will pick them up for you and turn them into Biofuel.

This is the 25th year of San Francisco’s Treecycling Program and if you miss it this year, make sure you remember next year.

Thanks to SFgate.com for the photo.