Do you clean your recycling before putting in the bin?

[Frosty66612]

Bit of a boring one but do you rinse out tins and yogurt pots etc before putting them in the recycling bin, or do you just put them straight in?

To those saying they don't want to waste precious water resources, unless you live in Cape Town, this isn't an issue. Mining for metal ores, processing and manufacturing of cans uses magnitudes more water than rinsing out the can and recycling it. Use the water left from washing up, or before you wash up and you're drawing water from the hot tap as it warms, collect that in a jug. You only need about an egg cup full of water. Tiny droplet of washing up liquid. Put the lid on the jar/bottle and shake vigourously. Use brush if required. Doesn't need to be sparkling cupboard clean, just clear of food debris.

Yes I clean them.

Also, you’ll be amazed at the cleaning power of water over time.

I ‘clean’ Nutella jars by filling with water, put lid on, vigorous shake, leave for two or three days. Empty contents, fill and shake again, if required, leave for a bit longer.

Admittedly it requires somewhere to put the jar that is ‘soaking’ but if you buy mucky food like that in big tubs anyway there aren’t many all dirty at the same time

There needs to be more info from councils so everyone knows. I don't wash mine as I assume it all gets washed at the other end by machines. I also thought if someone put general rubbish inside then that just gets removed. If it's causing so little stuff to be recycled then they need to do a campaign on it.

Yes I definitely clean anything that is going for recycling.

A) I don't want my house to stink while I'm waiting 2 weeks to put the recycling out

B) I'm mindful of the poor bastardised that have to sort though it all. A bad enough job without it being smelly and fetid too.

I don’t recycle raw meat trays, I think the contamination risk is too high to rinse so they go in the general waste. Meat from the butcher at least comes in a plastic bag so is using less plastic but isn’t ideal. I’d be happy with it wrapped in brown paper to be honest but it’s not really an option.

Tbh I’m not a fanatical recycler anyway (there’s plenty of information debating its benefits) and would rather concentrate on reducing my packaging purchases. I haven’t got the time or inclination to faff about if it wasn’t for lack of space in the general waste bin.

Tins, yes. Yoghurt pots, yes. Meat trays, yes.
Not everything though - I'm a bit slack when it comes to milk cartons and juice bottles (Australia, not UK).

Yes always. It'd be pretty revolting and smelly otherwise.

Use the water left from washing up, or before you wash up and you're drawing water from the hot tap as it warms, collect that in a jug

I have a dishwasher. I also live in an area with the highest water rates in the country on a meter. If I were 100% sure that things were really getting recycled, I would suck up the cost, but now I am not and the time and energy of properly washing, say, a big yoghurt pot (which is not clean after a brief encounter with a few drops of water) only to have it incinerated anyway.

I have definitely unwittingly contaminated lots of recycling by not washing enough in the past. Now I know, I recycle a bit less and focus on the easy to clean stuff/paper/cardboard. I definitely rinse jars/bottles as they rinse easily.

I don't think that's irrational, it's more sensible than starting to wash recycling in a dishwasher or additionally (we used to recycle a lot, inc preprepared dishes etc, not just the odd jam jar).

What do people mean by 'contaminating'? Do you mean that say, soup from a tin, could get onto some cardboard and then the cardboard can't be recycled? What would it matter if some soup got onto another tin or piece of plastic? Doesn't it all get washed in a big industrial washer at the recycling place anyway?

I give my stuff a rinse out or a better wash if oily, but I dont bother putting stuff in the dishwasher or anything.

Yoghurt doesn't come out with a quick rinse
Are you sure it's yoghurt you're buying?!

And yes, recycling takes up an awful lot of energy so it's much better to try and reduce our consumption of plastic and packaging at our end in the first place.

@BakedBeans47 same in our house! Or even worse I'll go to empty the recycling bag into the big bin outside and I'll have to sort through it all to take out everything he has put in that can't be recycled think crisp packets, cling film... ugh it drives me mad and now the kids have started doing it too! I'm gonna make a big poster for the kitchen wall with what can go in!

not usually. I barely keep on top of my normal housework at the moment. I didnt realise it contaminated everything. I will make more of an effort now

They haven't got to be hygienically clean. They do need to be clean enough that you won't get stuff rotting in your bin, or flies.

You can slosh them around in the same water after you've done the washing up. No additional water or detergent required. Cans and bottles will come clean with just a water rinse. Paper should be clean anyway.

Remember there will be people handling your recycling or standing at the conveyor. They shouldn't be subjected to rotting detritus.

How do people never wash up? I have loads of things that can't go in the dishwasher or else they get ruined. Do you people not at least run a little hot soapy water to wipe down surfaces with? Do you never wash your hands?

Please can someone tell me what the difference is between swilling a milk bottle out with dirty greasy foody dishwater,contaminating it with dirty greasy foody bits, and just putting it in the recycling as it is? Or between letting a dog lick a yogurt pot and just scraping out every last dreg of yogurt?

Do people really think the pots/bottles go straight to recycling? I'm overinvested in this considering I don't wash my recycling anyway (council say we don't have to) but I'm really confused that people think giving it a swill in any way makes a difference. Surely it has to be 100%clean for it to not surely contaminate the rest?

There was something on tv recently about recycling. Yes you should definitely rinse metals, plastics, cans, etc ('grey' washing up water is fine). Food encrusted cardboard and paper is useless apparently as it can't be rinsed off at any stage of the recycling process and the oils in food are impossible to get out. However, you do have to consider the amount of water that may be used when cleaning before recycling hence using dirty washing up water or remains of contents of kettle etc, basically any water that would otherwise just be tipped down the sink. Love the idea of just leaving Nutella jars soaking for a day or two I have to admit to being lazy and just binning them Probably works with peanut butter jars too

Look, water costs around about £1.70 per cubic metre. Using an egg cup's worth to shake and rinse your recycling is infinitesimally insignificant compared to 1m3. Like 0.00000001p! You must use your kitchen hot tap several times per day? Just draw some off from that into a jug while you're waiting for it to warm. Or there's a tiny bit of water left in the kettle after making a cuppa.

@arranfan

What's the benefit of lining some pans with foil if you end up having to scrape it and then wash it clean?

But what is supposed to be the point? Isn't that a tip to reduce washing up that was created at a time when people didn't expect to wash the foil and would just bin it?

No bin bags allowed even for non-recyclables - if it's not in the wheelie bins, it's not picked up. And they do random checks on the bins.

Does that mean you are banned from putting bin liners into the wheelie bin and have to throw all rubbish from indoor bins loose into the wheelie bin?
This sounds like a very hardcore council.

yes, I do the same as specialsubject, rinse in the end of washing up water, my neighbours don't and it gets quite rank after a week in hot weather, they leave theirs outside the front door

Argh but Nutella is really greasy, I wouldn't put any Nutella or peanut butter water down the sink for it to contribute to fatbergs. Maybe I should focus on there not being any actually left in the jar.

I honestly thought all they really wanted was us sort the recycling into the right bags so it didnt go in black sacks to landfill. I never really considered they didnt wash it and sort it further later.

I had heard that the majority of plastic recycling gets shipped to asia anyway and then they return most of it or incinerate it there or just landfill it anywy

I do, I keep it in a basket in the kitchen and empty it everyday into the bin, I have 5 cats so end up with loads of cat food tins

I wash everything properly. But my friend doesn’t and she puts raw meat contaminated packaging straight into recycling. I told her she shouldn’t be doing that but she doesn’t care. Really annoys me.