Collecting refuse once every fortnight (max 4 bags) - how do I manage this?

[morningpaper]

Our Council is bringing in a new rubbish scheme from October (when dd2 is due) whereby we can have a maximum of 4 black sacks every fortnight - the rest should be recycled.

I remember when dd1 was tiny we had ONE SACK of nappies a week. I can't face starting off with washables, it's too much stress with that horrible newborn poo, although I used them from about 6 months before.

I'm all in favour of the new refuse schemes, but how are other families coping with the new rubbish 'rules'?

Definitely will only COLLECT four bags a fortnight - they say you have to provide your own.

I always feel it's a bit mad DRIVING to the recycling centre for a few boxes of cardboard - isn't that WORSE?!

by taking plastics, cardboard, bottles, cans, aluminium foil and carrier bags to the tesco recycling,plus composting all veg waste we have gone from 4+bin bags per week to 2( and i have twins in nappies). I just load the car up with recyling on my way to tescos, so its not an extra trip/hassle.

While I'm all for reducing rubbish, I think restricting how many bags that can be collected is madness - bet fly tipping goes up drastically in the area once it's introduced .

Think it should be a carrot and stick approach - the carrot for households where as much help is given as necessary to make it as easy as possible to recycle. The very big stick aimed at manufacturers and supermarkets to minimize the packaging in the first place.

Incidentally - composting. I have a tiny garden with NO flower beds in - is it really worth my while trying to compost? (genuinely curious - it's something I've been thinking of)

There are regulations in place to target the manufacturers/suppliers - but only when they produce over a certain tonnage per year.

There are also massive flaws in the system that mean they can get round the regs as well .

i know this is going to affect us all at some stage so am interested - do they specify the size of palstic bag they will take? i mean not so big its an obvious piss take - but there are certain black bags which are quite a bit bigger.

we come under serco and they prvoide the bags if you havent got a wheelie bin. They are 'normal' as in average bin bags. Not the HUGE ones, bit not pedal bin liners either

really interested in this because

there is only 3 of us and we probably put out about 5/6 bags of rubbish a week
and we do recycle bottles and paper. I honestly don't know where it all comes from. Although i do work from home so have office bin rubbish but that can't amount to that much.

Any tips on how to reduce waste?

Our black wheelie bin is collected every fortnight and it's never been overfull (there is me, DP and baby ds in the house - ds wears disposables as his mummy is too lazy to change his nappies as often as clothies require).

It does smell a bit in the hot weather though.

We have a green bin (for garden waste and cardboard) and a green box (for paper, tins and glass), that get collected every fortnight too. I could take plastic bottles to a local recycling point but haven't yet done so .

Katierocket, do you recycle your office paper? What else is in the office bin?

Is there a recycling facility near you, at the supermarket maybe?

We have collections/facilities for:
paper
steel & aluminium (so all cans covered)
glass
cardboard
textiles
plastics
most food is composted

Doesn't leave a lot to go in the landfill.

We have 1 green wheelie bin for recyclables and 1 black for everything else. The black will hold 4-5 black sacks.

We don't currently compost because we are in a rented house with tiny garden and no use for it, so this goes in our black bags.

We are currently a household of 2 adults and 1 toddler in disposable nappies & we fill 4-5 black bags fortnightly, so I would have thought with composting you would be able to keep within the limits.

I don't buy much convenience food anymore which I've found has also significantly reduced our packaging - plus meat from butchers and fruit / veg from farm shop.

However, our local council DO recycle plastic bottles and cardboard, which I think still amounts to a huge proportion of our waste, so if they don't collect those, I think you will at least have to separate out your card and dispose of it yourselves, otherwise you wil not achieve it.

At least cardboard can be flattened & stored in a garage / shed without taking up too much space.

Our council don't collect glass so we have to take that ourselves.

It's weird how they all do different things!

so far we only have the bottles bin, which hasn't been collected for three months! and as we live on a busy road i don't want to leave it out on the street too often.
our halway currently has four storage boxes full of the damn things
annoying as none of us drive so taking it to a recycling point is impossible..
makes dp feel guilty at the amount of wine and beers he's drunk too..he he

We have three bins and a box for glass and cans. The recycle bin is just for paper and cardboard. I found the bottles were the thing that take up the most room so now I squash them and put caps back on.

MIL's recycle bin takes plastic as well she applied for another one and fills 2 every month.

I find I manage fine with 1 normal wheelie a fortnight.

Top tip don't forget to put rubbish out! It means another 2 weeks until collection .

If you get stuck with extras you could fill a couple of carrier bags and take them to big bins at back of local shop.

Take the days nappies in a supermarket carrier bag out for a walk with the pram to the nearest public rubbish bin.

What are you allowed to recycle? if this list is long enough it could be possible.

I'm horrified that so many people are taking dirty, smelly nappies and dumping them in council bins designed for all of us.

Your dirt is your responsibility.

If you're producing too much rubbish to deal with it within your own domestic setting, cut back.
Apart from anything else, this attitude is at odds with the councils comendable attempts at reducing rubbish and recycling.

Absolutely - I do agree with your spidermama and I use washables, recycle everything, use cloth shopping bags etc.

BUT when councils limit rubbish collection without providing or sometimes even suggesting alternatives...

Our council only give 26 bin bags a year included in rates, this is more than ample for us and includes picking them up every week (they are special ones and only these are collected). If you need more then you buy them at $1 a time including pick up. This system is good because if you have a small baby and choose disposibles you are factoring in $1 a week extra to get rid of them. not worth the effort of filling a public bin.

Morningpaper's issue is that they are only collecting every 2 weeks (yuk) and and they will only pick up 4 whatever. This scheme is very flawed and so she may have to dump some in a public bin (which they will empty every day?)

tbh 4 bin bags a fortnight seems reasonable. We only produce 1 or 1 and half a week, and have 2 kids. One of whom is still in nappies. We also get recycliing box collected every week though and that is usually full to overflowing!

took a car load of rubbish from our garage to the dump today. it is now very orgainsed with different skips for each type of rubbish. lots of it is therefore recycled and not put into land fill. but it was a bit of a pain, lugging it all up the stpes and sorting it into the different skips.

i childmind between 5 and 9 children a day usually 4 - 7 of them in nappies. I empty as much as possible down the loo, wrap tight and bin the nappies. We have one collection every 2 weeks for waste, and our bin is never overflowing. Admittadly I only have the children 7.30 until 6 but that is a lot of nappies.

I am seriously considering buying cloth nappies and doing cloth while the children are with me, but when I have asked the parents I have been told that they would prefer me not to. So when interviewing new parents I slip in that I might change to cloth nappies - so that eventually I maybe able to change.

We recycle loads and have a recycling bin emptied on the other fortnight (waste one week, recycle then next) only 2 complaints they don't take gardern waste (so I have to take it to be composted at the tip) and they don't take glass so I have to take it to a bottle bank

We create about 2 black sacks of landfill waste per week (one child in nappies), I recycle glass, paper, tins, cardboard, plastics and garden waste. Everything is collected by the council except cardboard and plastic which I try to take to the tip en route to somewhere else, so it isn't a special journey. Our rubbish reduced massively since recycling the plastic and cardboard, although it does take up a lot of room waiting to be taken to the tip.

I think the current thinking is:

Reuse
Reduce
Recycle

I am also giving all my reuseable items to my DSs pre-school for junk models.

I've reduced what packaging I can by buying my veg loose, trying to buy items with less packaging etc etc.

I am recycling what I can, I put all my papaer, glass and tins in recycle box and take plastic items to recycling point.

I've yet to get a composter but thats my next step and i'm going to order one off my councils website in a mo.

Just found this which tells you exactly what to do with household rubbish:

www.bristol-city.gov.uk/Fuguri/frame.html?N+NHM01209+BG+F+BMM00106+NHM00107

ludicrous really. If they want people to recycle then they should collect what people want and need to recycle.
In Los Angeles, they started a similar one to what your council is proposing about 8 years ago. It's been an enormous success, BUT they will collect ALL recyclables including cardboard and plastic which are an enormous part of what should be recycled. It is unreasonable to expect people to drop these things off at a recycling center themselves and also counter productive since in order to take any reasonable amount of stuff you would need to make a trip in a car, thereby creating more pollution. It's far more environmentally sound to collect the stuff (economies of scale)...it's just that it's not cost effective for the councils to do it, so they don't. Saving the environment isn't free.

I agree they should collect re-cycling stuff before rationing rubbish collections. People will end up dumping inappropriately if they can't find another way to get rid of their rubbish.

I recycle everything that can be recyled, plus I have a compost heap in the back garden and a compost bin in the front. My council were giving away free ones recently - tip - the compost from the heap reduces much quicker than the bins.

If you can't bear the thought of washing nappies, MP, could you bear the thought of using a laundry service? They work out at more or less the same price as disposable nappies and it would cut out one rubbish bag per week. Plus you don't have to be faffed with the washing. Many councils are giving you incentives to use them as well - it might be worth giving the Real Nappy organisation a ring to see if your council is one of the ones who are doing incentives (and if not, to lean on them to do so - if they're this keen on rubbish reduction, they should be using these schemes).

From our council we have the green wheelie bin for normal waste, a Brown Wheelie bin for garden waste and a Blue Wheelie bin for paper.

For Glass and Cans you have to take them to a recycling point, luckily for us there is one right across the road, but it only take aluminium cans not steel. the point across the road takes, glass, paper, textiles and cans. the main recycling point which is about 2 miles away from our house also takes books. Nowhere takes Cardboard.

I don't know how many bin bags we get through in a week but I'm going to count next week just out of interest.