Praise for Rutland residents over recycling

Rutland County Council is saying thank you to residents who helped to cut down on waste and improve the quality of recycling collected from homes over Christmas.

Christmas is when Rutland generates the most waste – almost 1,000 tonnes per month over the festive period.

If non-recyclable items are placed in grey bins it can seriously disrupt the recycling process and stop large loads of materials from being recycled altogether.

Rutland County Council (7508247)Rutland County Council (7508247)

Following checks on Rutland’s festive waste, figures show just over six per cent of recycling collected in December 2018 was made up of materials that should not have been placed in grey bins – items such as black plastic, polystyrene and food waste. This figure represents a big reduction from December 2017, when almost 12 per cent of grey bins contained materials that could not be recycled.

Coun Gordon Brown, Cabinet Member for Waste Services at Rutland County Council, said: “We’d like to say a big thank-you to everyone who helped to half the amount of household waste wrongly put in grey bins over Christmas. This is waste that could have prevented tonnes of recycling from being processed correctly.

“Rutland has really strong recycling rates. We know this is an important issue for many of our residents and so we use some of the best recycling facilities in the country as part of our commitment to manage waste properly and protect the environment.”

To help people recycle more, the Council launched a festive waste campaign with advice to make sure only the correct materials – those that can be recycled to make new products – were disposed of in grey recycling bins.

Rutland’s 12 Days of Festive Waste campaign drew a huge response from people on Twitter and Facebook, many of whom said they would change their recycling habits as a result. There were also more than 9,000 visits to waste and recycling information pages on the Council’s website throughout December.

None of Rutland’s waste goes direct to landfill. Everything placed into black bins is sent to a special facility in Nottingham where it is used to generate electricity. Once this process is complete, a small amount of what remains following the energy recovery process is sent to landfill. This represents less than three per cent of Rutland’s total waste.

For more information about recycling and reducing waste, including a full A-Z guide of which household items can and cannot be recycling, visit: www.rutland.gov.uk/recycling.