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.

I noticed at work people used to put unrinsed containers in the recycling. Bloody disgusting.

All the posters saying people must have smelly bins, what are they supposed to smell of? It's a bin !! I get mine cleaned once a month but I don't expect it to smell great all the time

@Namechangedox

All the posters saying people must have smelly bins, what are they supposed to smell of? It's a bin !! I get mine cleaned once a month but I don't expect it to smell great all the time

I expect our landfill bin to smell, but not the bin for tins and glass. One smelly bin is enough.

That may be so, but I'm not putting anything that is in the "recycle" list into the main bin because I don't want to get fined. I'd rather the recycling centre figures out what to do with a grimy pizza box than get a fine in the post.

Also we have separate bins for paper and plastic - and they won't take the bin if one is in the wrong bin - but I've walked behind the bin on rubbish day and there is only one area that it all goes into!

I think more clear instruction would help. And honesty. Like not making householders - me - feel they have to lean headfirst into the plastic bin trying to fish out a piece of paper knowing full well that these things will be reacquainted with each other the instant my bins are picked up.

I actually didn't know that it didn't get recycled (but rinsed them anyway)

According to what was on BBC today pizza boxes are fine but I gathered that they should have any food scraped off.

Grease is fine .

I'm nit using my water to throughly wash these things that I know will nit be recycled

It annoys me that we have to waste water rinsing rubbish so I tend to chuck it in the dishwasher. But I agree not enough people know you have to at least get the worst of the stuff off it. A couple of years back I was WFH and the bins were out and it got really windy. I went to rescue mine before it blew over, but half a dozen of the neighbours bins had tipped, so I went round and picked them up, gathering up any rubbish which had spilled. I was really surprised how many had left recyclable half eaten ready meals and tubs still with caked on food and stuff. No effort to clean them at all. It says right there on the council website about cleaning it.

We have separate containers - box/bag for glass, plastic bottles & cans, and paper & card. Council is happy to take extra card piled up on the side , or if you add an extra open box with any of the other recycling as long as it's separated as they ask. Our collection lorry has different sections according to our containers .

We keep ours in the shed and I always rinse in case of attracting rats .

I actually didn't know that it didn't get recycled (but rinsed them anyway)

It does where I live.

I didn't know this. Thank you

Wait you can't recycle pizza boxes!?

This is what we can't put in our blue bins (paper and cardboard):

What you shouldn't put in

Wet cardboard
Food stained cardboard
Brown envelopes
Wrapping paper
Greeting cards with glitter, foil or embellishments
Food waste or anything with food residue
Pizza boxes
Nappies
Disposable coffee cups
Juice cartons (Tetra Pak)
Tissues
Wet wipes

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”

Good grief, you’re right! Don’t know why the hell this hasn’t occurred to me, it’s so bleeding obvious.

So, why are we supposed to separate it all? Anyone actually know?

My council say no need to wash, I rinse glass and tins as I have a tub on the side that I put all my recycling in, the cleaner then sorts it into each bin for me. Sometimes if there is a lot I will make a game out of it with the DC and they throw it into the correct colour bin. If I didn't rinse the recycling, it would be quite grim!

Our recycling gets collected by different lorries, so all the brown bins (tins and glass) get collected by a different lorry to the one that collects paper and card, and another lorry collects garden waste.

Only 3% of the waste generated in our council area goes into landfill. The rest is either recycled or used to create energy at power stations.

Fire up your gas boiler to rinse recycling items.

The extra energy used to run the hot water balanced against avoiding landfill deposits ....

Something doesn’t compute ecologically hmm

‘Environmentally’ / typo

I didn't know it was a requirement but have always carefully washed tins, bottles, etc., particularly after seeing a TV programme showing people working on recycling conveyer belts who were having to pick out all sorts of dirty containers. Presumably then it wasn't necessary to ensure recycling items were clean. I think it's a good idea but I'm fairly sure a lot of people are not aware of the requirement.

It's not a requirement. It's dependent on where you live. Our council have said it's not necessary

The extra energy used to run the hot water balanced against avoiding landfill deposits ....

Or wash them with your normal dishes. No extra required.

Ha! My local tip you throw everything in the right section, then they scoop it up and chuck at the back in big piles and it evidently gets mixed up, so I often wonder what is the point then 🤔

Ha! My local tip you throw everything in the right section, then they scoop it up and chuck at the back in big piles and it evidently gets mixed up, so I often wonder what is the point then

If you’ve seen this happen, there will be specific reasons for it.

If the suggestion is that it will all end up in landfill, that is just not true. Council have to pay way more tax on rubbish that goes to landfill and can gain revenue for recycled material. They aren’t going to trash recylabkes if they can help it. On some occasions where they have too much to process or if their plants aren’t able to work at capacity, some will send it to landfill but it will never be an operational policy to collect recycling and send it to landfill.

Of they have a mixed recycling plant where they can separate recycling, they still may ask people to use separate skips at the tip. This is because if they had mixed recycling skips, people are far more likely to think everything goes in there. Human nature means if you have ten bags of mixed recycling to put in the skip, you might just chuck in that 11th bag of landfill waste to save you going round to the general waste skip at the back. Who’s going to know, right? Asking people to separate removes that risk.

@Cosyblankets

Wouldn't you just wash it anyway so the bin isn't smelly

This

This simply isn’t true. I work in waste. Most MRFs are a mixture of automated and manual picking- the people are picking the contra items like big bits of plastic film or bulky textiles etc- not checking individual cans. Then all desirable fractions are sent for reprocessing.

If recycling is kerbside sorted then it is bulked up at a depot/transfer station and sent to a reprocessor where all materials are washed during the reprocessing.

MRF rejects are directed to further sorting plants or energy from waste- rarely landfill.