N to W of recycling

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Nappies

For information about using real cotton nappies, follow the link.

Newspapers, magazines, and other types of paper

Over 30 per cent of the content of your rubbish bin is paper and card which could be recycled.

All Shropshire's household recycling centres (HRCs) provide facilities for paper recycling and cardboard recycling along with your local paper banks, or through your fortnightly doorstep collection scheme.

What can be accepted for recycling?

Listed below are the type of paper which are generally accepted for recycling – check the instructions on your local paper bank or contact your local council for full details:

• Computer printouts
• Envelopes - not window envelopes or padded envelopes/Jiffy bags
• Junk Mail
• Magazines
• Newspapers are ideal candidates for recycling. The entire newspaper, including inserts, is acceptable, except for things like plastic, product samples and rubber bands.
• Phone books.
• Mail order catalogues.
• Cereal boxes and shoe boxes
• White and coloured office paper.

What can't be recycled?

• Corrugated cardboard (recycle this at a household recycling centre or put in your compost bin)
• Carbon paper
• Food-contaminated paper
• Oil soaked paper
• Plastic laminated paper such as fast food wrappers, juice boxes, and pet food bags.
• Sanitary products or tissues
• Stickers
• Thermal fax paper
• Waxed paper and waxed cardboard milk and juice containers
• Padded envelopes

What happens to the collected paper? It is sent to a paper mill in Cheshire to be made into newsprint – so yesterday's paper could become tomorrow's!

Other things you can do

Take unwanted books to your local charity shop so they can be re-used, or donate them to local charities etc.

Save unwanted paper at work - reuse it as scrap paper for writing notes or use it for internal photocopying or faxing.

Photocopy on both sides of a piece of paper - it could cut paper consumption at work by half.

Stop junk mail – follow the link on this page for more information.

If you do not want to receive free newspapers or flyers, why not put a notice on your door asking for them not to be delivered.

O

Oil

Never pour engine or fuel oil down the drain – it can pollute water courses and water supplies and harm wildlife. Household recycling centres have oil banks for waste engine and fuel oil. It is processed into a heating fuel.

Cooking oil? Don’t pour it down the drain as it can cause blockages. Try making bird cakes from solid fat and seed. Small amounts of cooking oil can be added to compost heaps.

P

Packaging

Whilst packaging helps to protect goods, packaging waste represents a large proportion of household waste.

Pesticides

See entry for Chemicals – Household/garden

Plastic bags

See entry for Carrier bags

Plastic bottles

The average household in the UK uses 373 plastic bottles a year. Bottles can be recycled into drainage pipes, guttering – and even into fleece jackets.

Banks for plastic bottles are provided at Shropshire's household recycling centres and at a number of other locations

What bottles can we accept for recycling at the household recycling centres?

On the underside of most plastics there is a number surrounded by the recycling triangle
If it is Type 1 or Type 2 then it can be accepted.

Type 1 ‘PET’ e.g. fizzy drink, water and beer bottles

Type 2 ‘HDPE’ e.g. milk, washing up liquid bottles.

‘Wash, squash and remove the tops’

What can’t we accept?

We cannot take other type of plastic. Such as Type 3, 4 and 5

Any other plastic items – sorry no food trays, yoghurt pots etc. Our reprocessor can’t recycle these.

R

Refuse collection

For more information follow the 'useful contacts' link in the menu bar.

S

Shoes

All of Shropshire's household recycling centres can accept shoes for recycling/reuse, either in special shoe ‘boxes’ or the textile banks. Wellington boots cannot be accepted for recycling. Tie your shoes together, or put them in a bag.
Some charity shops also accept shoes in good condition, for resale.

Soil and rubble

Quantities of more than a tonne cannot be accepted at Shropshire's household recycling centres, and there are no facilities for dumping this waste on the ground.

Use a reputable authorised waste contractor or skip service to dispose of any waste produced by works other than normal day to day living, such as house alterations, driveway reconstruction, garden makeovers etc.

T

Televisions

Televisions and computer monitor screens are regarded as hazardous waste and should not be disposed of in the general household waste.

If your old TV isn’t suitable for sale, it can be taken to a household recycling centre. Ask the attendant where to put it.

We now have a recycling scheme for televisions and computer screens, which are sent to a specialist reprocesser. Computers from businesses cannot be accepted at the recycling centres.

Textile recycling

All the household recycling centres (HRCs) in Shropshire have facilities to recycle your old textiles, as do many of the local recycling banks provided by the district and borough councils

You can take old clothes, linen and paired shoes to the textile banks at an HRC or local recycling sites, or put them out for the kerbside recycling collection days by your local councils or local charities.

Why not take good clean wearable clothes straight to your favourite local charity shops?

Wearable materials go to charity shops and developing countries while non-wearable materials are used for filling materials, wiper cloths or the fibres are reclaimed and re-spun.

If you deposit shoes for recycling, please tie them together so they don't get separated!

Timber

According to ‘Wasteonline’, the UK uses three times the world average of wood, per head.

Timber is often suitable for reuse - someone else might want your unwanted wooden furniture or offcuts!

Skips or bays for timber are provided at Shropshire's household recycling centres.

What types of wood can we accept for recycling?

All soft and hardwoods, wooden boxes, floorboards, wood offcuts

What we can’t accept?

Tree off-cuts, chipboard, plywood, fibreboard, painted, heavily varnished or treated wood, windows and doors containing glass or cardboard interiors. Contaminated loads are rejected by the reprocessor!

What happens to the wood?

We send it to a merchant to be chipped, and it is then made into fibreboard.

Tyres

Most tyre dealers accept waste tyres on payment of a small fee. Tyres cannot be disposed of in landfill sites and must be recycled.

Individual car tyres can be accepted at Shropshire's household recycling centres. Commercial vehicle, lorry and tractor tyres will not be accepted.

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Wood
(See entry for timber)