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Plastic bottles and cardboard - recycle it!

New blue-lidded bins for fortnightly collection of plastic bottles and cardboard

• Plastic bottles
• Cardboard

From October 2008 we will start a fortnightly kerbside collection of plastic bottles for recycling using 180 litre wheeled bins with blue lids. To keep the number of vehicles needed to a minimum we will be collecting plastic bottles and cardboard in the same bin. Collection days will be detailed in a leaflet that will arrive with your bin.

Delivery of the bins will start in August so that all 49,000 households have their bin in time for the start of this service. You can use them straight away to recycle your cardboard but please no plastic bottles until October when the new collections start.

Until your blue-lidded bin arrives, please see current kerbside recycling arrangements.

For more information download our full Guide to the new waste and recycling service 549kb.

Plastic bottles

What plastic bottles will be recycled?

• soft drink bottles
• milk bottles
• washing up liquid bottles
• shampoo bottles
• household cleanser bottles

Please do not put other plastics in the recycling bin, because there are different types of plastic, some of which are more easily recycled than others. There are also differences in the commercial markets for different types of plastic.

Plastic products carry a number (usually 1 – 7) in a triangle indicating the type of material they are made from. Types 1 – 3 are the most easily recyclable.

Bottles make up the majority of all household plastics and are virtually all type 1, 2 or 3. Although other plastic products, for example food trays and yoghurt pots, may be type 1, 2 or 3, many are not. The lorry-loads of plastics sent to the commercial re-processors need to be free from ‘contamination’ by other types of plastic, therefore the advice is simply to recycle plastic bottles. If the re-processor finds a significant proportion of other plastic products in the load, they are likely to reject it, making everyone’s recycling efforts a wasted exercise.

Please help by only putting plastic bottles in the recycling bin.

Cardboard

What do we do with cardboard before the start of the new collections?

The current separate collection of cardboard will continue until the start of the new service. To prevent litter please put cardboard out for collection either bundled and tied or placed in a cardboard box.

Cardboard is collected on the same day as your black box is emptied, but please put your cardboard alongside the box not inside.

What cardboard will be collected for recycling?

• cereal boxes
• corrugated cardboard
• cardboard sleeves
• paper fibre egg boxes
• clean frozen food boxes
• cardboard tubes (e.g. from toilet rolls or kitchen rolls)
• shoes boxes
• greetings cards

Please ensure all plastic packaging has been removed and boxes flattened.

What cardboard will NOT be collected for recycling?

• take-away food packaging
• disposable drinks cups
• waxed cartons e.g. Tetra Paks (fruit juice, UHT milk etc)
• waxed boxes or packaging
• boxes containing food remnants e.g. pizza boxes
• boxes with plastic windows
• books

Why can’t cardboard and paper be collected together as it used to be?

Paper and cardboard are used for different products and commercial re-processors, who buy the material from councils, require them to be collected and delivered separately as it is expensive to separate and therefore has a lower market value. If it is not collected separately, we risk having to dump mixed material in landfill.

Will there be a problem when cardboard is collected with plastic bottles?

No. From trials undertaken, separating plastic bottles from cardboard is a simpler and quicker process than separating paper from cardboard.

Why can’t waxed cartons (eg. Tetra-paks) be recycled?

Recovering materials from these products is a very different process to other cardboard-based products. Currently there is only one re-processor, in Sweden, able to recover some of the board for recycling and use the remainder as a fuel source.

Hills Waste Solutions is looking into providing collection points at their recycling centres throughout Wiltshire shortly. For more information contact Hills Waste on 0845 603 2085. Alternatively, you might want to buy plastic or glass bottles that can be recycled more easily.