BY CATHY JETT

The holidays are over and shipping boxes, Christmas trees and champagne bottles have been kicked to the curb.

But chances are good that some of that trash will be recycled and could reappear long before the next holiday season rolls around.

Paper mills, for example, use paper packaging to create the corrugated cardboard that gives shipping boxes their inner strength. And Christmas trees can be shredded into mulch or turned into compost in time for spring planting.

Americans throw away 25 percent more trash during the holidays than any other time of year. That adds up to about 1 million extra tons of solid waste created nationally each week between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Locally, the uptick begins with a doubling of paper and plastic dropped into recycling containers after Thanksgiving, said Ben Loveday, director of Spotsylvania County's solid waste division. Usually the first to appear are sturdy shipping boxes, he said, followed by gift wrap, gift boxes and the rigid plastic packaging that many presents come in.

"We see an increase in glass and aluminum later in the month," he said.

Most people apparently don't start recycling worn-out or outdated electronics until the middle of January, said Julie May, Rappahannock Regional Solid Waste Management Board analyst and outreach coordinator.

"One year we tried to have an electronics recycling event right after Christmas. It didn't get a lot of participation. Later on in January, before the Super Bowl, there's a much bigger rush. Our timing was off."

Today, the Regional Landfill and Recycling Center, which serves both Fredericksburg and Stafford County, partners year round with Goodwill to recycle computers and computer equipment through Goodwill's "Reconnect" program with Dell. The electronics are either resold or salvaged for parts and precious metals, said May.

Nationally, recycling and composting prevented 85 million tons of material from being dumped in landfills in 2010, up from 15 million tons in 1980. This prevented the release of approximately 186 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent into the air in 2010. That's like taking 36 million cars off the road for a year.