NORFOLK, Va. (AP) — The Navy is sending fewer of its shipboard mattresses to landfills.
The mattresses from two Virginia-based aircraft carriers and another ship are having their parts recycled by a South Carolina company this year for other uses.
In all, the Navy plans to recycle 13,000 mattresses from the USS Enterprise, USS Abraham Lincoln and USS Mesa Verde as part of the pilot program.
Navy officials say it is less expensive to recycle the mattresses than send them to a landfill. Recycling mattress material will also save more than 100,000 cubic feet of landfill space.
Gregory Jeanguenat, Naval Station Norfolk's Integrated Solid Waste and Recycling Site manager, says he hopes the program will expand to other ships, barracks and Navy lodges in the future.
