You might pay $95 to recycle a mattress, just like I did.

• Recycling my old queen-sized mattress in New York was challenging and cost me nearly $100.
• Over 75% of mattress materials, including wood, foam, steel, and fiber, can be recycled.
• The economics can be challenging for recyclers.
• Some states have implemented mattress recycling laws that reduce the cost for consumers, but these programs are financed through a fee on mattress purchases.

I paid $95 to recycle a mattress.

It seems strange to spend so much money on disposing of a common household item.

The high cost of mattress recycling in the U.S. demonstrates the challenges of being an environmentally conscious consumer.

Approximately 50,000 mattresses are discarded daily in the United States, totaling 15 to 20 million mattresses annually, according to the Mattress Recycling Council.

Most end up in a landfill, experts said.

Alicia Marseille, a sustainability and circular economy expert at Arizona State University, stated that mattresses are "among the most challenging items to recycle."

"It's a massive waste stream," she said.

'It'll probably be there for hundreds of years'

My queen-sized mattress, which is a hand-me-down from family and likely over 20 years old, needs to be replaced. According to MRC, the average mattress lasts about 14 years from manufacturing to disposal.

But what to do with it?

In Brooklyn, residents can dispose of a mattress for free through routine trash pickup.

It was distressing to consider my wasteful habits contributing to the landfill.

According to Meg Romero, the recycling and litter control superintendent for Charles County, Maryland, if you dispose of your mattress in a landfill, it is likely to remain there for hundreds of years without being broken down.

I thought surely, I can find a new home for it.

Wrong.

After two weeks of unsuccessful attempts to donate to local homeless shelters, The Salvation Army, Goodwill, and community forums like Buy Nothing and The Freecycle Network, I had run out of patience for a free giveaway option.

Donating a mattress to certain groups may allow individuals to claim a tax deduction for its fair market value on their federal tax return, but only if they itemize their deductions.

I probably neglected to reach out to some interested parties, but someone else may have had different results. However, my personal cost-benefit analysis led me to decide to stop donations.

Experts said that there are only a few U.S. companies that do the same work as Renewable Recycling Inc., which is based in East Rockaway, New York. A directory compiled by MRC lists only 55 such companies.

How a mattress is recycled

According to MRC, over 75% of a mattress can be recycled, while some companies claim it's closer to 90%.

Secondary markets are where recyclers sell materials like wood, steel, and various foams and fibers that they have stripped from their original sources.

Rewritten: The shredded foam and fibers can be used as carpet padding, animal beds, or insulation; wood can be used as mulch or fuel; and springs can be recycled as scrap steel, for instance.

"The mattress recycling program launched by Charles County on Aug. 1 will give those materials another life to be used as something else, as Romero of Charles County stated," said Romero.

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Experts noted that the reuse of materials in manufacturing has other environmental benefits, such as reduced greenhouse gas emissions, water and energy use, and the need to extract or source new materials.

Residents of Charles County can recycle up to two items per day at the Charles County Landfill without any charge. Any additional items will cost $10 each.

In September, more than 900 mattresses were recycled by residents, which exceeded officials' estimates by more than double, Romero stated. The county collaborates with a Baltimore-based company, Deco Solutions, for managing the recycling process.

Charles County's motivations weren't purely environmental, though.

According to Romero, mattresses occupy a significant amount of space in the county landfill due to their bulky nature.

"Peter Conway, president of Spring Back Colorado, stated that landfills are finite spaces and are intended for items that decompose quickly and can be easily compacted."

"Mattresses are the opposite of that," Conway stated. He anticipates diverting 8 million pounds of waste from Colorado landfills this year.

Why mattress recycling can be expensive

According to Conway, the $95 fee I paid to Renewable Recycling is "typical" among mattress recyclers.

The cost of transporting my mattress from my Brooklyn apartment to the company's warehouse in Oceanside, New York, was covered. Although I could have saved $55 by dropping off the mattress myself, I don't own a car.

The cost of dropping off a mattress and box spring at Spring Back Colorado is $40 per item. If a consumer requests home pickup, an additional fee of $60 or more will be applied based on the travel distance.

According to Romero of Charles County, mattresses are more difficult to recycle compared to other items such as plastic bottles, aluminum cans, and cardboard.

"Romero stated that each mattress is constructed differently without a uniform design, and various materials are used to make one mattress."

Breaking them down by hand is often a more time- and labor-intensive process, she said.

Before shredding or baling cotton remnants for sale to scrap markets, they must first be picked off steel mattress springs, according to the Mattress Recycling Council. Additionally, staples must be removed from wood frames before they can be sold, it stated. Each coil in a "pocket coil mattress" must be individually separated, as Romero explained.

'Razor-thin margins'

According to Reid Lifset, a research scholar and resident fellow in industrial ecology at Yale School of the Environment, mattress materials generate only "modest revenues" when sold.

Those revenues often depend on fluctuating commodity prices.

"Conway stated that the price for a ton of foam or steel is not set by them and can fluctuate, such as from 18 cents per pound one day to 10 cents per pound the next week."

Sometimes, shipping costs increase due to market demand for commodities, even if those markets are not located nearby.

Spring Back Colorado previously shipped its foam and ticking to a recycling center in California, which cost the company approximately $2,000 per truck load, according to Conway.

A year ago, our California partner ceased accepting shipments because demand had decreased, according to Conway. He reached out to companies in various locations such as Mexico, Canada, India, and Egypt in search of alternative placements but eventually found a new partner in Texas.

"It's pretty razor-thin margins we operate on," Conway said.

Spring Back Colorado generates extra income through mattress pickups and drop-offs, as well as collaborations with businesses and municipalities, according to him.

""Consumers typically bear the responsibility," stated Marseille of Arizona State University."

Consumer fees subsidize recycling efforts

Some local governments are encouraging mattress recycling by making it more affordable for consumers.

The Environmental Resources division of Charles County, Maryland, receives about $150 of residents' taxes annually for services such as curbside recycling, yard waste disposal, oil and anti-freeze disposal, and now mattress recycling, according to Romero.

Since 2013, three states - California, Connecticut, and Rhode Island - have implemented mattress recycling laws. Oregon is set to launch a similar program on January 1, 2025.

The mattress industry must establish and implement state-funded programs to gather and recycle old mattresses at no cost.

The initiative is funded by consumers, though.

In California, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Oregon, individuals and institutions pay a fee of $10.50, $11.75, $20.50, and $22.50, respectively, each time they purchase a mattress, according to Amanda Wall, a spokesperson for the Mattress Recycling Council (MRC), which is a nonprofit organization established by the International Sleep Products Association, a mattress industry trade group, to manage these state programs.

MRC funds consumer recycling efforts by forwarding fees paid by retailers. This allows for free mattress drop-off and recycling at any MRC-funded collection site in participating states, Wall said. Retailers can still charge a fee for mattress pickup, she added.

Wall stated that the mattress industry has advocated for similar legislation in New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, and Virginia this year and intends to continue collaborating with these state legislatures in 2025.

Companies are being held responsible for the end-of-life of their products through "extended producer responsibility" policies, as seen in the laws adopted by states, said Marseille.

Some question whether consumers shoulder too much of the burden right now.

"According to Conway, companies are not producing more easily recyclable products, so it is up to consumers to determine how to dispose of their items in a responsible manner."

To encourage recycling behavior, he believes it should be simpler and more affordable for consumers.

If given the choice between discarding an item or recycling it, 95% of people will opt for the cheaper option, according to Conway.