Whatever does not get loaded on or carried on, if it can be recycled, eventually ends up at the Navy's recycling center.

There are separate sections for cardboard materials, cans, plastic, scrap metal and wood.

"Your bottles and cans, yard waste, scrap metal, cardboard … we kept over 10,000 tons of that material out of the landfill in 2007," said diversion manager Ted Schleutker.

The key, Schleutker said, is to keep all those materials out of landfills.

The Navy diverts close to 65 percent of materials it uses and will be honored by the city of San Diego for its recycling effort.

It's one thing to recycle all this stuff, which the Navy certainly does, but they sell enough of their scrap metal to pay for the entire program.

Chairs, desks, filing cabinets and other similar items all get stripped of bolts and other fasteners and sold for scrap.

"Right now, things are looking great, as the value of steel is up, the value of copper is up; we sell the expended brass casings when the Navy SEALs shoot them and they train a whole bunch and that value changes. But yeah, that revenue does fund our program," said Schleutker.

The Navy said it is committed to being as green as possible even a building where administrators oversee the effort at bases in three states is made from recycled materials.