It’s the season to love your brown recycling bin

Residents throughout the borough of Bury are being urged to spring into recycling and give their brown recycling bins a bit of extra love.

With the days getting longer, the weather on the up and the Easter holidays upon us, this prompts many of us to go outdoors, spruce up our gardens and get rid of all the dead stuff leftover from winter.

Bury Council’s recycling team is asking residents to recycle as much garden waste as they can, along with their food waste, but to also bear in mind a few important ‘dos and don’ts’.

Glenn Stuart, the council’s head of waste management, said: “The garden waste and food waste from brown recycling bins gets turned into valuable compost for use back in gardens. This is why it’s really important that no one puts things in their bin that can’t be composted.

“When the wrong stuff gets mixed in with the right stuff this can spoil a whole load and mean everyone’s efforts go to waste - and we also have to pay extra to dispose of the spoiled load.

“It actually only costs £61 per tonne to turn food and garden waste into compost.But if a load is rejected because it includes the wrong stuff it costs us and our taxpayers £350 per tonne to treat and dispose of the spoiled load.”

This is the right stuff for brown recycling bins:

• Garden waste: Grass cuttings, hedge clippings, cut or dead flowers and plants, leaves, bark and twigs, small branches and small logs.
• Food waste: All cooked and uncooked food such as fruit and vegetables, meat, fish and bones, tea bags and bread, egg shells, plate scrapings and any food past its use by date.

This is the wrong stuff for brown recycling bins:

• Plant pots of any kind, bricks, stones, large logs or tree stumps, pet waste and other garden-related items such as a garden hose, plastic toys, paddling pools.
• Plastic bags or packaging - all garden waste must be placed loose inside the brown bin and food waste must either be inside a compostable liner or loose.

Glenn added: “Last June, thanks to our residents embracing recycling, we reached a fantastic 63% recycling rate. If everyone can keep to these simple ‘dos and don’ts’ we’ll save more money for other public services, give our recycling rate an extra boost and we’ll all be making a difference and doing the right thing for the environment.”

Any resident who needs a kitchen caddy or liners to help with recycling food waste can collect them free of charge from libraries, Bury Town Hall, Six Town Housing at 6 Knowsley Place or Customer Support and Collections at Whittaker Street, Radcliffe.

To sign up for free email alerts for all your collections, or for more information about recycling, visit www.bury.gov.uk/recycling or phone the information line on 0161 253 5555.

ENDS

Press release issued: 13 April 2017.

Picture: The Wong family in Whitefield using their brown bin.