Green Hands USA: America Volunteers

The United Nations is currently in the middle of a project to plant 1 billion new trees, and one way they hope to accomplish their goal is to turn your old cell phone into a tree.

Yes, you read that right.

One of the UN's tree-planting partners is a site called PlantMyPhone. The service lets you recycle your old phone to fund the planting of new trees.

We've talked about the need for cell phone recycle before, but here's the gist: The EPA estimates that of the 140 million cellphones retired per year, only 10% are recycled. The remainder decay in drawers in our homes or end up in landfills. Cellphones contain toxic materials such as lead, mercury, beryllium, arsenic, cadmium, and antimony. If incinerated these substances can pollute the air we breathe, in landfills they can leach into local water systems.

When you visit PlantMyPhone, you get a chance to donate your old phone to help stem the tide of this e-waste problem. Once you enter in your old phone, you can either print a pre-paid mailing label or request a mailer be sent to you. PlantMyPhone will then plant a minimum of 1 tree per phone, and an average of 15 trees per phone. These trees are planted in tropical regions that have the highest efficiency in fighting climate change.

Oh, one more incentive: if you turn in your old phone, you'll be registered for a chance to win $1,000.

So don't let that old phone get up to no good. Turn it into a tree and help the earth in the process.