One of the worst things that can be put in landfills is refrigerators. They take up a lot of room and many old fridges used Freon which leaks eventually spilling that toxic ingredient into our waste streams and atmosphere. Even worse the amount of illegal dumping of old refrigerators, which cost each taxpayer lots of money for cleanup.
I Just Gotta Tell Ya
- Over 1 Million RV Refrigerator in Landfills today
- 90% of Refrigerators can be repaired with a few simple parts
- About 16% of unwanted refridgerators are still in working condition.
- ENERGY STAR estimates there are over 47 million refrigerators over ten years old in the U.S. If every American home replaced its pre-1993 refrigerator with an ENERGY STAR model, enough energy would be saved to light more than 8.1 million homes for an entire year.
- An estimated 12 Million US consumers are expected to purchase a new refrigerator a year.
The Value of Refrigerators
- 25-100% of typical steel Appliances can be recycled and made into cars
- Refrigerators manufactured prior to 1995 contain Freon which can be recycled for use in older car air conditioners.
41 Ways To Reuse or Recycle Refrigerators –
No matter what you do, Remove the Latches
1.) Repair your fridge, cleaning the inside is simple using common non- toxic cleaners such as baking soda, lemon juice and vinegar.
3.) Donate – to Habitat For Humanity, Restore or other Used furniture and appliance stores
4.) Give Away- Using Sites such Craigslist, Giving Away and YinYango, will take away the fridge
5.) Recycle- Many places such as Home Depot in exchange for purchase will take away your refrigerator. Many local state and city governments also offer recycle Fridge rebates.
6.) Start a Business and recycle Refrigerators for profit
7.) Use as a coffin (after taking out toxic materials)
8.) Make Shelving for clothing, books,
9.) Put in garage for those times you need extra refrigeration.
10.) Make a Pet Shelter- take out trays, lay on it’s site, put a door on the side, paint or decorators
11.) Make a pond- remove doors, trays and shelves and other toxic substances, bury, plumb and you have a pond.
12.) Make a Solar Water Heater,
13. ) Make Art
14.) Make a House
15.) Make an Armoire- Take out the shelves and trays, put in pole, paint and a new closet
16.) Make a desk- Take out the shelves and trays, put in a sliding shelf and voila a hidden desk!
17.) Make an animal watering hole- take out toxic materials and a new watering hole.
18.) Make a raised bed in a garden- No need to buy raised beds,
19.) Use as a cooler- having a lot of people over, fill with ice and put drinks into
20.) Need an extra bed?- clean it out, put in padding and now you have a bed.
21.) Make a smoker -made an awesome smoker out of an old freezer. The existing racks are great for smoking hams, or turkeys, salmon. Cut a 6″ hole in the side, down low, for the smoke box. Attach a smoke box from an old smoker and seal it up. Cut a 3″ or 4″ hole in the top and add some galvanized stove pipe pipe for the vent.
23.) Make a worm bed
24.) Use as a compost pile
25.) Hold potting soil
26.) Use as a root cellar- bury in the ground and use the door as the opening.
27.) Store pet food, will keep the mice and other varmits out.
28.) Make New Storage
29.) Make a Car
30.) Take off the door and make a fence
31.) Make into Kegarators with iPod docking station
32. ) Make Kitchenware
33.) The doors can be used for sledding or a toboggan.
34.) Use as coffee table
35.) Use as outdoor benches
36.) Make tables out of the doors
37.) Make a water fountain
38.) Make a kids pond for fishing games.
39.) Make a sandbox for kids
40.) Use the framing for an elevator
41.) Make a Couch
Resources
Really enjoyed this article post. Keep writing.
you need to explain how to get the freon out. you talk of the need, but not the how to. also, repairing old refrigerators, costs? I like the coffin and raised bed garden ideas. thanks for the imagination. but , really, who has all this time to do these things? , jim
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Our fridge just went out and seems a waste to just throw it in the landfill. Found this page via google and the list is great. It would be awesome if it included more info on these things, i.e. removing hazardous materials from the fridge and making into said item. Thanx for the ideas though
Freezers, fridges, washers, and dryers usually have nice, big expanses of straight sheetmetal. I’m hot-rodding a ’58 Sunbeam Alpine and the floorpans were rusted through. I cut the sides of an old freezer into shape, bent, and welded them to the existing sheetmetal. The battery box is cut from one side of an old washing machine.
It was asked in the comment section: How do I get the freon out?
Well to clear up a few things the old refrigerant was R-22 and was termed as freon. Scientists say that R-22 damages the ozone. Most all refrigerant you see in failed refrigerators are the newer R-134a and is not freon, it’s only referred to as refrigerant. I read that R-134a does not harm the ozone, yet the laws put in place when R-22 was still being sold still exist today for the R-134a, that you must collect the gas for recycling, even though it does not harm the ozone, therefore, you could cut the line and the gasses will not harm the ozone.
There is oil in the compressor, you could dump that out and take it to an oil recycling center, usually an auto parts store in the US. The oil is great for a quick filtering through a paper towel and added to the older Diesel trucks, it increase mileage and horse power in my 95 Dodge Ram Cummins engine.
Inside the refrigerator compressor is a motor and some scrap yards will pay you a copper content price for the whole thing (without the oil). If your refrigerator has R-22 then you may have to pay somebody a hefty fee just to capture the freon.
Very efficient written information. It will be beneficial to anybody who utilizes, including me. Keep up the good work. For sure I will check out more posts.
Thank you for this post.. We are Appliance Parts and Supplies with refrigerator parts, dishwasher parts, dryer parts and more..,,..
My frig stopped cooling. So I got a new frig. The old frig was in my home when I bought this house in 1977. How can I get the freon or whatever out of it? Thanks very much for any thoughts.
Great article. I will re-use the frig instead of throwing it away. I thought there had to be some ideas of uses.
Here’s a 42 use. My fridge recently busted. I’m using it as an outside toybox for my son. Add a hinge to both fridge and freezer so the doors dont slam down on the kids. turn it onto its back and fill with outside toys walla you have a toybox