What do I do with my used water filter cartridge?
August 29th, 2010 | 
Author: Okay, so I bought a Pur water filter pitcher so that I would stop buying so much bottled water, with the intention to be more environmentally friendly.
The time just came to replace the cartridge for the first time. What do I with the old cartridge? Can it be recycled at all? I don’t like thorwing things in the trash if I don’t have to.
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According to PUR, the filters are not recyclable at this time. Throw them in the trash. Otherwise you just cause problems for recyclers when they are doing their seperating.
I would dismantle it and recycle the individual pieces. Wear safety goggles!
There is one company in the U.S. that has begun recycling water filters (see link below), but it isn’t PUR. U.K. based Brita has also begun recycling water filters as well, but these filters have to be mailed to an address in Britain.
As Global Environmental Technologies points out, the really alarming aspect of sending water filters to the dump is, "Drinking water filters are supposed to do one thing: remove the impurities from your drinking water. That means that if the contaminants are no longer in your water, they must be in your filter. There are a ton of toxins in your water filter because they build up over time."
Thus, all those filters in the dump leak the pulled toxins back out. Not good for anyone in the long run.