Recycling symbol
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The universally recognized recycling symbol (♲ or U+2672 in Unicode) with three chasing arrows is a Möbius strip or unending loop. August Ferdinand Möbius, the nineteenth century mathematician, discovered that a strip of paper twisted once over and joined at the tips formed a continuous, single-edged, one-sided surface. The loop will remain twisted when the ends are connected if there are an odd number of twists in it (in the classic example, one; in this case, three).
In 1969 and early 1970, worldwide attention to environmental issues reached a crescendo, culminating in the first Earth Day. In response, then Chicago-based Container Corporation of America, a large producer of recycled paperboard which is now part of Stone-Smurfit Corp. (St. Louis), sponsored a contest for art and design students at high schools and colleges across the country. As a 23-year-old college student at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, Gary Anderson won the contest, and, by doing so, graphically helped push recycling forward. Because of the symbol’s simplicity and clarity, it became widely used worldwide, and now is as common as the Nike "swoosh" and the Coca-Cola lettering.
The Möbius loop symbol is in the public domain, and is not a trademark. The CCA originally applied for a trademark on the design, but the application was challenged, and the corporation decided to abandon the claim. As such, anyone is free to use the recycling symbol, although local laws may restrict its use in product labeling - such as, for example, when its use on non-recycled goods would be misleading and/or deceptive.
[edit] Variants
As the use of the Möbius loop symbol is not regulated, countless variants of it exist. Anderson's original proposal had the triangle formed by the arrows standing on its tip — upside down compared to the versions most commonly seen today — but the CCA, adopting Anderson's design, changed it to stand on its base instead.
Both Anderson's proposal and CCA's official design had one of the arrows folding the opposite way from the other two, such that they produced a Möbius strip with one half-twist. However, many variants of the symbol have all the arrows folding the same way, producting a Möbius strip with three half-twists. Even the versions that do have one of the arrows folding differently generally can't agree on which of the arrows should be the different one.
The American Paper Institute originally promoted four different variants of the recycling symbol for different purposes. The plain Möbius loop, either white with outline or solid black, was to be used to indicate that a product was recyclable. The other two variants had the Möbius loop inside a circle — either white on black or black on white — and were meant for products made of recycled paper, with the white-on-black version to be used for 100% recycled fiber and the black-on-white version for products containing both recycled and unrecycled fiber.
In 1988, the American Society of the Plastics Industry (SPI) developed the resin identification code which is used to indicate the most common material used in the manufacture of the product or packaging. Their purpose is to assist recyclers with sorting the collected materials but they do not necessarily mean that the product/packaging can be recycled either through domestic curbside collection or industrial collections. The SPI symbols are loosely based on the Möbius loop symbol, but feature simpler bent arrows that can be embossed on plastic surfaces without loss of detail.
An infinity sign (sideways figure eight) inside a circle represents the permanent paper sign, used in packaging and publishing to signify the use of acid-free paper.
[edit] References
- Resource Recycling, May 1999. "Gary Anderson Has Been Found!" (PDF)
- Everson, Michael; Freytag, Asmus (2001-04-02). "Background information on Recycling Symbols" (PDF), ISO/IEC Working Group Document N2342
[edit] See also
- Resin identification code - SPI resin identification coding system (NA Society of the Plastics Industry) for classifying different recyclable plastics.
