Waste disposal and recycling

[Lullabelle]

Mod. Edit: This post and the following few posts have been moved to start a new thread about waste disposal and recycling. This topic (particularly the issue of non bio-degradable plastics) has been a hot topic in the news in the UK recently.

We have orange bags for recycling, they are so flimsy, easily ripped no matter how careful you are, sometimes end up using 2 because 1 is ripped and stuff is spilling out.

 

[epicuric]

We have orange bags for recycling, they are so flimsy, easily ripped no matter how careful you are, sometimes end up using 2 because 1 is ripped and stuff is spilling out.

I don't understand why local councils can't get their act together. We are pretty fortunate in Shrewsbury. General waste and recyclable waste are collected on alternate weeks. The recyclable waste (bottles, food containers, plastics etc.) goes into sturdy black boxes, paper and card in a strong bag, whilst compostable garden waste goes in a green wheelie bin. Other than that we don't have to sort anything, and any non recyclable waste gets incinerated to provide electricity for local homes. The council works in partnership with Veolia, who really seem to have things under control.

I was horrified a couple of weeks ago when visiting Aberystwyth. It was obviously bin collection day, and all the local businesses and town centre dwellings had put out their (mainly food) rubbish in black poly bags on the pavements throughout the town. It is a seaside town, thus seagulls aplenty. Who could possibly have foreseen that seagulls would rip apart flimsy bags containing food waste, and strew the contents all over the pavement? The tourists must have been mightily impressed.

 

[Lullabelle]

I don't understand why local councils can't get their act together. We are pretty fortunate in Shrewsbury. General waste and recyclable waste are collected on alternate weeks. The recyclable waste (bottles, food containers, plastics etc.) goes into sturdy black boxes, paper and card in a strong bag, whilst compostable garden waste goes in a green wheelie bin. Other than that we don't have to sort anything, and any non recyclable waste gets incinerated to provide electricity for local homes. The council works in partnership with Veolia, who really seem to have things under control.

I was horrified a couple of weeks ago when visiting Aberystwyth. It was obviously bin collection day, and all the local businesses and town centre dwellings had put out their (mainly food) rubbish in black poly bags on the pavements throughout the town. It is a seaside town, thus seagulls aplenty. Who could possibly have foreseen that seagulls would rip apart flimsy bags containing food waste, and strew the contents all over the pavement? The tourists must have been mightily impressed.

We used to have green bins for recycle but couldn't put glass in them! However a few years ago they changed to the bags and they are for everything recycleable. They are collected every Tuesday, I don't put ours out until the morning because we have foxes around here and they tear the bags open to get scrapps they can smell and they make a mess.

 

[medtran49]

I was horrified a couple of weeks ago when visiting Aberystwyth. It was obviously bin collection day, and all the local businesses and town centre dwellings had put out their (mainly food) rubbish in black poly bags on the pavements throughout the town. It is a seaside town, thus seagulls aplenty. Who could possibly have foreseen that seagulls would rip apart flimsy bags containing food waste, and strew the contents all over the pavement? The tourists must have been mightily impressed.

You should see and smell Venice in the summer on tradh day and the day after.

 

[sidevalve]

We have to pay extra to have garden waste collected and it must not contain any of what they term 'kitchen waste'. At what point does garden waste become kitchen waste ? If I grow potatoes and a few are spoiled do I put them in the garden waste ? If so what about potato peel or cabbage leaves ? We have a separate plastic box for glass but we mustn't put any broken glass in it. Newspapers in the normal recycle bin must not be in a bundle - black plastic [so no bags] sweet/biscuit wrappers and bubble wrap all aren't allowed. TBH it's easier to just dump the lot in the rubbish bin and forget the whole idea. Sorry world but I remember glass milk bottles [re-used] glass pop bottles [re-used] paper carrier bags [easy to recycle] wooden boxes at the greengrocers and fish and chips in newspaper [and strangely the print never seemed to poison anyone]. I also remember dustbins - no black plastic bags then. Modern recycling/waste management - joke

 

[Elawin]

We used to have green bins for recycle but couldn't put glass in them! However a few years ago they changed to the bags and they are for everything recycleable. They are collected every Tuesday, I don't put ours out until the morning because we have foxes around here and they tear the bags open to get scrapps they can smell and they make a mess.

We have orange bags for recycling but are only allowed to use them for plastic drinks, milk and shampoo bottles, thin card, newspapers and magazines, and drinks cans, food tins and pet food tins. If you put anything else in there, even if it is supposed to be recyclable, you get the bag thrown back in your garden with a warning attached. Everything else has to go in black bags including food and animal waste but not glass (unless it is broken glass, in which case you are allowed to put it out suitably wrapped with a note on it) and gardening waste (for which you have to pay an exorbitant price for green bags or bins). You can also put out batteries, small electrical items which will fit in a carrier bag, and cardboard which must be tied up and put out separately. Food waste has to go in the black bags, so cats and foxes have a field day if you put anything out. You have to take glass bottles and jars, clothes, shoes and tetrapaks to the various recycling points around the borough, some of which can be 3 1/2 miles away. I have a compost bin in my back garden for general garden waste. I have very little food waste at all, and usually what food waste I have goes in the dog. My general household waste usually fits nice in a box that normally holds 160 tea bags. I give plastic bags, carriers etc to the driver when he delivers my shopping.

 

[Morning Glory]

I have lots to say about recycling but I'm interested to know if it is such a hot topic in other countries as it is in the UK.

Recycling is big in the news at the moment in the UK. The issue of plastics, which don't biodegrade and are causing damage to marine life was hi-lighted in the last episode of Blue Planet II. Since then, this issue has been in the news regularly in the UK.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

recycling is also a hot topic here as well. Paying for plastic bags is/has just been introduced and the result is that people are tending to bring their own bags with them or pay. A lot of shops though have simply changed over to offering brown paper/thin cardboard bags as an alternative.

As for recycling - well if you are rural and that means not in a town or city and anything that isn't a paved/metalled road (and remember here that more than 60-75% of roads in the areas I have lived are not paved roads (in fact where I am, in the council area I'm in it is something over 1,000km of roads here that are unsealed compared to less than 500km of sealed roads) we don't get any refuse collection at all. We are all expected to take our rubbish and recycling to the local collection point. Most places now only have collection points. Very few actually have a 'tip' of their own. So when you dump your recycling next to the non-recycling, you are assuming that a) somehow it is kept separate and b) it is recycled. A point to note here is that we don't separate anything aside from garden/green waste, anything recyclable, general waste. Metal stuff, fencing, corrugated iron/tin, electrical appliances, pallets are kept separated and you have a separate area to 'dump' them in assuming that you go to one of the larger sites. Otherwise, our mixed recycling is all in one place, mixed up and presumably sorted by something else somewhere else.... our non-recyclable stuff is landfill and green/garden waste is composted.

As you enter the collection area, you are asked what you've got and charged accordingly. Usually we only have 1 * 60L black bin of non-recyclable stuff so we only get charged every other visit. Recycling and garden waste is free. So when we turn up with the trailer sky high with garden waste, the car full of recycling and 1 black bin (you know that old style that people had before wheelie bins happened) we only get charged on average $2.50 a visit. But we are lucky. We are know by site to the men at the depot as eccentric and those odd British couple that separate their recycling out!

On the 1st December last year, the state we live in (NSW) started the 10c refund on certain plastic and glass bottles. You are taxed at the point of sale for these containers (they are marked up, but most still carry the old labels and don't yet say you get the money back in NSW and more to the point, multiple packets where you buy 10 in a box, don't have a bar code on them and I think I have mentioned this before, but if you don't have the barcode, you can't recycle them here in NSW because the machine you put them into is using the barcode to identify them. But you are still charged 10*10c (i.e. $1 extra) for buying it.

Australia has a lot to learn from the Nordic Countries who are by far the best I know at recycling.

 

[classic33]

A little over 21% of materials handed over for recycling are actually recycled, industry figures. The rest goes to landfill, incineration or sent abroad.

For plastic bottles, approximately 50% of the bottles sold are returned for recycling. Of that, less than 7% actually end up actually being recycled. By the people paid to do the recycling.

Biggest problem being crosd-contamination. This can be something as simple as the colours not being seperated. A clear bottle is worth uptosix times more than a clear coloured bottle.

We will soon, if the local councillor has his way, have seperate containers for each type of plastic and each coloured plastic within that group. At the last count there were 27 different containers required. Since this was pointed out, he's remained silent on the subject.

The containers he had in mind were none recycleable plastic. Throw it away when broken and buy a new one, prices started at £12!!

 

[The Late Night Gourmet]

Different areas have different rules about recycling. Where my parents live (Omaha), they have separate bins for glass, paper, and plastic. I have one large bin where I can put all 3 types of recycling, and presumably someone at the recycling center sorts them.

Recycling is entirely voluntary both here and in Omaha. I end up having to fish recyclable materials out of the trash, since I can't seem to get anyone else in the house to care about it.

Some areas have rules are that are more stringent (I just read that Pittsburgh will issue a warning if they don't see any recycling along with your trash bin, and a fine if you persist in not recycling).

 

[The Late Night Gourmet]

On the 1st December last year, the state we live in (NSW) started the 10c refund on certain plastic and glass bottles. You are taxed at the point of sale for these containers (they are marked up, but most still carry the old labels and don't yet say you get the money back in NSW and more to the point, multiple packets where you buy 10 in a box, don't have a bar code on them and I think I have mentioned this before, but if you don't have the barcode, you can't recycle them here in NSW because the machine you put them into is using the barcode to identify them. But you are still charged 10*10c (i.e. $1 extra) for buying it.

Michigan also has 10 cents-per-can/bottle recycling, likewise charged at the time of purchase. Strangely, it only seems to apply to carbonated beverages (like beer or Coke) and not to fruit juice, liquor, or bottled water.

Even stranger (to me) is that so few states have a return value on cans and bottles: only 10 of the 50 states do. There is literally no roadside littering of such containers in Michigan: if someone actually threw one out their window, I'm sure someone else would happily pick it up. Sometimes, I see (underprivileged people) fishing through trash cans, looking for returnable cans and bottles.

Likewise, the only people I know of in Michigan who would throw a 10 cent deposit can or bottle in the trash are teenagers (who I have a hard time getting to care about anything).

 

[Lullabelle]

One of my colleagues refuses to recycle because he saw a programme on the tv once and apparently it is a waste of time. I disagree.

 

[The Late Night Gourmet]

One of my colleagues refuses to recycle because he saw a programme on the tv once and apparently it is a waste of time. I disagree.

I recall hearing that recycling doesn't have as much of an impact on our carbon footprint as, say, not reproducing. There's at least one person I know who stopped listening after the doesn't have as much of an impact part. Maybe that's what he saw?

 

[Frizz1974]

The whole thing is a bit of a nightmare here really. We suck at it to be honest.

Where I live, which is about 4 hours drive from SNSSO, we have a yellow lidded wheelie bin for plastic, glass & cans. This is supposedly sorted elsewhere. However, most people don’t know that anything with a lid on is rejected as the lids are generally a different sort of plastic. This is emptied fortnightly. We have a weekly pick up of the general waste bin with a red lid. Green waste is collected just twice a year.

We were better at when I was a child.

There used to be 5c return on bottles & “cash a can” was massive here in the 1970’s with aluminium being scrapped for cash by weight. Almost every house had a can squasher attached to a fence post or the side of the garage and usually some sort of large crate to store the squashed cans until there was enough to make it worth it to take them in.

My maternal grandfather used to supplement his pension by walking the streets of their home town collecting cans, I remember it embarrassed my Dad who had an electrical contracting business there.


The bottled water industry, of which I was a part for 5 years, has a lot to answer for. Tap water is available almost everywhere in Australia & it’s of a very high standard that some visitors are amazed we use it for showering, washing & flushing the toilet.


I could go on & on...

 

[Lullabelle]

I recall hearing that recycling doesn't have as much of an impact on our carbon footprint as, say, not reproducing. There's at least one person I know who stopped listening after the doesn't have as much of an impact part. Maybe that's what he saw?

Possibly.