To tell you that if you don't wash your recycling...

[MrsColon]

...before you put it in the recycling bin, it won't get recycled?

If you don't rinse out cans, containers, bottles etc. they will be rejected and go into landfill.

Not enough emphasis is placed on this in recycling campaigns, and in my experience, the majority of people just don't realise this.

Tons of recycling gets shipped to China. It’s a mad world.

Campaigns around here said you just have to rinse it. No one is going to scrub their recycling, especially because they know it all ends up in the truck with everyone else's recycling.

It’s bizarre how different the rules are in different councils. Our recycling has to be cleaned and can’t include bottle tops. So you rinse and recycle the milk bottle, but the green top is to go in the household waste bin. Dh’s dad lives 10 mins away, but in a different council area. Their recycling information leaflets specifically says no need to rinse, and they can also leave the bottle caps on to be recycled.

60 percent gets burnt so what's the point In it being clean?

@Ugzbugz

60 percent gets burnt so what's the point In it being clean?

Most of the 60% that gets burnt is burnt because it isn't clean.

@SummerHouse

You are right. I only know as DP worked is waste and would nearly faint if I tried to put a pizza box it. "IT'S CONTAMINATED!!" Scared the shit out of me.

I thought this but according to this piece published today you merely need to scrape off the food and sauce (some grease is OK).

www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-59133056

Our local scheme says a quick scrape, rinse if wanted. Basically no 3D food waste.

@Mia184

I live in Germany and we don‘t have to rinse the things that go into the recycling bin. They still get recycled. Why should it have to be rinsed?

Sorry, but they don't - a large amount of Germany's recycling is sent overseas for "processing". In reality it's just dumped.

@Ugzbugz

60 percent gets burnt so what's the point In it being clean?

That might be the case where you live, but it isn't everywhere.

I wash my recycling, it's easy to rince things. Also don't want my inside recycling bin stinking too much.
My mother in law was asking me and sil this last weekend and was surprised we bothered. She doesn't but is a bit lazy and doesn't have much of a clue or care about the environment. She thinks cheap plastic toys are great because it doesn't matter if they don't last long as you can just chuck them and buy new ones as they were cheap. I despair at the shit she buys the kids sometimes. Some people have no clue.... sorry for going off on a tangent there!

@VainAbigail

So if I wash each thing I put for recycling, and the bin folk tip my whole bin in with every other streets recycling, do the people at the other end look at each individual item and determine the clean items and pick them out?

curious

Biffa are the UKs biggest commercial waste provider and they definitely have picking lines.

My mother in law was asking me and sil this last weekend and was surprised we bothered. She doesn't but is a bit lazy and doesn't have much of a clue or care about the environment.

By rinsing you also are wasting resources and don't have a clue how.much work goes in to get that water too you so she could say same back at you.

Unwashed shouldn't go into general waste and into landfill, it should be set up to wash the unwashed.

Wash and squash was the mantra from the beginning. Yes though, absolutely we could be reminded, especially when it can effect the whole bin of recycling.

We used to export a load of our plastic waste to China, now it's Malaysia and Turkey and no one bothers to see what happens to it once it gets there because they don't care. It's all pretty depressing.
www.greenpeace.org.uk/news/plastic-recycling-export-incineration/
We really need to phase plastic out completely.

I watched a reliable documentary a couple of years ago that said more energy and resources are used in producing the water that washes the recycling than is saved by recycling it.
Where does that leave us?

So, I assume the non washers only ever use their dishwashers and never handwash anything?

There was an item on one of the BBC science podcasts about it a few months ago (maybe Crowd Science) where they interviewed an expert about it. She said that you don't have to wash every single crumb/drop out of it, but you need to get rid of enough that it wouldn't be considered contaminated. So take away pizza boxes are usually not recyclable unless they don't have any grease marks on them.

We put our jars and stuff through the dishwasher. Tins I often rinse while using, so if I'm putting chopped tomatoes in a sauce, for example, I'll fill the empty tin with the stock/water/wine for the same sauce and rinse it out like that. Sometimes I rinse things in the water butt ouside, if I don't have any other washing up to do. The question on the podcast was about whether it was more environmentally friendly to just chuck stuff away if we had to waste water washing it, and the answer was to try not to use water especially for the recycling, e.g. using the dirty water at the end of washing up.

@Branleuse

It might contaminate stuff but at least theres no limit on amount of recycling bags you can put out. Youd think they could employ people to sort recycling like they do in parts of france ( and i assume in many other places too) I dont really feel able to wash all my rubbish, since im already overwhelmed with the dishes

Not here. In the recycling bin or it's rejected. Ditto waste bin

In our town , the area I live in was the test area for recycling. We had wheelie bins for all recycling for about 12 months before the rest of the town . About 5 years ago they decided to do a trial for food waste providing us with small food bins , a caddy for the kitchen and biodegradable bags to go in them . The trial must be ongoing after all those years because nobody else in the town has these bins yet but ours are emptied by the council every week.

@Grenlei

I'd be more persuaded about this if our council didn't ask us to separate our recycling, and then come bin day the bin men chuck everything in the same refuse lorry.

🤷

Ours do this too!! We still recycle everything we can but I don’t faff about with it. It’s so frustrating to see it all get thrown into one big truck.

1/3 of our local recycling gets incinerated instead of recycled due to ‘contamination’. They’ve built 2 incinerators within a stone’s throw of each other. Money better spent on recycling education/facilities I’d have thought.

Uh, really? People don't know this? It's just common sense. It doesn't have to be immaculate but take most of the food off. I mean it just makes the recycling process more energy consuming if they have to first wash out foods.
As for people who can't be bothered, shame on you.

We wash or at least rinse all tins, glass and plastic that go into the recycling. It’s surely gross and smelly not to. Does the average person really need telling?

@Yourdeadtome

Fgs whos got time for that?

We all have the same 24/7/365.

Rinsing your recycling takes seconds.

I didn’t know this. I thought everything went through some sort of pressure washer - although I don’t know why I thought that? Maybe Toy Story 3?