Council joins national campaign to save recycling from the bin

READING COUNCIL is urging residents to carefully consider how they dispose of items which could be recycled.

Today marks the start of Recycle Week 2024 and, according to the latest figures from re3, an incredible 68% of what is put in grey bins in Reading could be recycled.

The Council is keen to see residents think carefully before they throw items in the bin. It is encouraging them to reduce unnecessary waste by trying first to find a different use for items, or if they can’t then to dispose of them correctly instead of putting them in their grey bins. These include:

• Food waste (21% of grey bin waste): Get creative and use leftover food items. Enter the products’ names into a zero waste recipe generator app such as SuperCook to find a great new recipe, and make sure anything else goes in your food waste bin
• Textiles (8% of grey bin waste): Even ripped and damaged clothing can go in one of Reading’s 40+ textile banks located around the town, and reusable clothes can go there or to a charity shop
• Glass (4% of grey bin waste): Glass bottles and jars can be turned into lamps, candle holders or liquid soap containers, or recycled in one of Reading’s 48 bottle banks
• Paper, card, tins, plastics, aerosols, foil and cartons (22% of grey bin waste): Tin cans can be decorated and used as handy storage containers for art supplies, pens, cutlery holders – any items you need grouping together to tidy up by stopping them lying around the house. Cardboard can be used as a layer over the top of a compost heap in winter to act as an insulator, and you can make your own biodegradable pots for seedlings from toilet roll inners. If you can’t imagine a reuse, other cardboard, plastic, foil, cartons and tins should be squashed, cleaned if soiled, and put in your recycling bin

• Wood, metal, garden waste and electricals (13% of grey bin waste): remember small electricals (up to the size of a toaster or kettle) can be left on top of your recycling bin to be taken away with your recycling, and garden waste can be disposed of through a subscription to the Council’s two-weekly garden waste collection service which costs less than £1.50 a week

Re3’s recycling centres, including at Island Road in Reading, can recycle more than 25 different material streams from large items such as appliances and furniture to small things like coffee pods, batteries and vapes. Vapes, along with batteries, should never be disposed of in your bins at home due to the possibility that they can cause fires, which has happened five times this year alone at the re3 centre in Reading, causing damage to the facility and worse, endangering staff as they work.

Residents confused or unsure of how to dispose of particular items can get help by downloading the re3 Scrapp App, a new free recycling app designed to help with recycling and waste reduction in an accessible, engaging and user-friendly way. With over 36 million products currently in the database, it enables users to scan product barcodes to offer instant, location-specific recycling guidance. The app encourages users to search for recycling guidance on items they are unsure of and provides easy access to all local waste services.

Now in its twenty-first year, Recycle Week (organised by Recycle Now) is the UK’s biggest celebration of recycling, shining a light on the nation’s recycling habits through activities happening across the UK. The latest Recycle Now research shows that while we’re a nation of recyclers - nine out of ten people regularly recycle – nearly eight out of ten of us (79%) put one or more items into the bin that could have been recycled. These include deodorants, plastic trigger sprays, yoghurt pots and toilet roll tubes.

Throughout the week Reading Borough Council’s social media will use the national campaign’s ‘Rescue Me – Recycle’ theme to highlight items that can be kept in circulation by finding ways to reuse them, or at the very least recycling them instead of binning them.

Karen Rowland, Lead Councillor for Environmental Services and Community Safety, said:

“We know many residents in Reading appreciate the importance of recycling to help keep waste from unnecessarily going to landfill, but the figures show that despite this two-thirds of what goes in Reading’s grey bins should have been recycled through other means. This comes at a tremendous cost to the Council in disposing of waste. So we’re asking residents to get creative and think more carefully when they go to put anything in their bin as to whether it could be repurposed or if it should go somewhere else instead.

“That pair of socks with holes in them should go to a textiles bank instead, any glass should go to one of our many bottle banks around the borough, and many people don’t realise that aerosols – be they deodorants or squirty cream cans – can also be recycled in your red recycling box rather than thrown away. If we all start thinking more when we dispose of an item and make small adjustments to our habits, together we can recycle so much more, minimise our impact on the environment, save valuable resources and reduce disposal costs.”

Craig Stephens, Senior Campaign Manager for Recycle Now, said:

“We are delighted that Reading Borough Council is supporting Recycle Week. While a light-hearted campaign, recycling is essential to limit the impact what we buy has on the environment. Keeping these materials circulating means we can reduce emissions linked with our weekly shop. Most people are recycling, and the material we capture has a multitude of uses, so the next step is to ensure everyone captures everything they can. Every aerosol, every trigger spray bottle, every plastic pot and toilet roll tube: Rescue – recycle!”