Recycling - how do others cope?

[Huge]

Sigh. Pop! goes the benfit of recycling them.

[mich]

Its likely to take me more than a month ( and that will mean as much as six weeks hanging around waiting for collection day) to fill a sack with tins/cans etc as I dont use very many. I actually buy fresh food or grow it and the wrappers - plastic bags and film etc for that food are all non recyclable by the way (not my fault)

As for newspapers, that sack may take even longer to fill. I have few papers or suitable junk letters and most of them end up on the fire ( I have a coal fire). No mains gas where I live, and I have electric central heating. The only thing I can put into this bag is my home shopping catalogue ( twice a year). They do not take the yellow pages, that has to be taken down the supermarket or burned! Quite honestly the very selected thigs they take are a waste of time for me as I dont have many and I will be forever filling the bags

There is a third bag for old textiles ( clothes) but this bag is only for selected items and you have to wash and dry them first!

So, my old clothes, which never get cast off before being ripped or beyond redemption, will still have to be bagged and taken down the amenity tip!

Additionally, all foil has to be put in a carrier and put out inside the tins bag. Jars have to be put out seprately in a carrier or box,( and where do I put those between time too? And all cardboard and brown paper has to be bundled and placed alone.

It would be easier to take it down the supermarket and put it in the skips. Frankly I think they are taking the p*ss with my time and effort- and without asking me first. And without thinking it through enough to suggest storage solutions for the bags and simply failing to recognise how inconvenient sacks over the kitchen floor are.

And they do smell , even with clean cans in. At least I can smell them, its a thickness in the air, a whiff of something not pleasant not a distinct dirty smell as such . Its hard to describe.

These bags were just dumped on the door step with a leaflet telling me I was now in a recycling area.

The council will collect old batteries? Not so here. Would that they did, might make it worthwhile. I have to take such things to the amenity tip - and thats where my other stuff ended up too as a rule if I got a pile up at all.

As for putting them outside. Despite the fact its all cleaned before binning, I still think it will attract vermin ( I live in the country , the vermin are in the hedge outside already. Its my hard paving, religious clearing of the area and gravel areas that keep them at bay already. Putting these bins near the house will simply attract the local wildlife and vermin catchers.

On the other hand taking them down the garden far enough away means lugging stuff down ( in cold and rain) and lugging it back out to the front when its collection day. And then, I will have to invest in /make some form of container for the bags. I can hardly leave them sitting about on the garden. When empty they will fly away, when full they will be a curiosity to the foxes and cats ( who love open bags as play things , and think can footie is a wonderful pastime by moonlight! )

So , hopefully you see my concerns and problems.

Has no one else got this sack scheme? Are you all on wheelie bins/ plastic crates/ or whatever?

[Martin]

What really confuses me is that they will accept glass bottles for recycling, but not old window/picture glass; plastic bottles, but not other plastic packaging (even when it's the same plastic!); news papers but not yellow pages/old phone books/junk mail.....?

Recycling is important, I do all I can; but the rules just don't seem to make any sense!

[David Hearn]

Why does recycled goods have to be cheaper than non-recycled? I'm not someone who worships the environment, but I can see the sense in reducing the amount of waste we just bury into the ground. There is a cost to this, hence recycling may not be cheapest. There is also the thing that some things have a finite resource (oil as a major one). Why bury goods which requre oil to produce (eg. plastics) when they can be recycled? Surely its better to do that than just hide it in the ground?

Personally, your posts almost sound like a troll who likes baiting people who recycle. ;)

D

[David Hearn]

Rinsing takes practically no water if you do it at the end of the washing up in the not-so-clean water. Enough to stop it smelling and makes it clean enough for recycling.

Evidence to back this up?

[mich]

For the record, I do rinse them, thats a requirement. But they still smell of something not quite nice , especially after being in there for six weeks!

Though I

I do have a dish washer - and so I do have to clean these separately. Further, I have to be careful because if I put too much junk down the drains it will clog them and b*gger up my septic tank eventually, probably.

If

I dont have a schedule at home. Its simply as fast as possible because I wouldnt have a life otherwise. I already work more hours than I have available ( when you take out travelling time) so every minute at home is precious.

I dont have a garage or an outside utility available for this! Not everyone has a garage you know - and if I had a garage , I would want to put my car in it, not use it a Steptoes - back -yard - recyling - in - waiting -centre.

I have a shed, but its my garden shed and its full of garden stuff ( lawn mower etc) And I'll be b*ggered if I will give up my outside loo for the job. I use the loo when I am gardening. I also have a greenhouse , and that is a greenhouse, not a utility room in conversion.

I dont have a rabbit hutch house either - its a two bed bungalow but my kitchen is fully fitted and the pantry is used as a pantry. There isnt a "utility room". I do have a seperate dining room, but I am not going to eat with this rubbish round me. I do have a lounge, but I refuse to sit with refuse ( sorry about the pun) when watching TV There is room for one bin only in my kitchen.

Now there is the rub. I dont know who to. It seems they have an outside contractor doing it. Do I complain to the council who take b*gger all notice anyway like as not, or to the contractor , who will probably care even less?

rant over.

[mich]

How many times do I have to say this?

NO IT DOESN'T!

I do rinse them. They are well clean by the time they get in the sack, but the sack still stinks. I can smell it. Its a thick , dirty person type smell , as if I've had a tramp dossing in the kitchen at night.

As for the vermin. Ive already explained that too. Foxes and cats like noting better ( just out of curiosity) than to get inside plastic sacks and nose around and pull the contents out. And mice scratch and bite the bags open just to see what they can find and to live in (especially paper)

I am in the country and I do have a "problem" in that mice are a natural part of life here. Given a chace they come in , especially in winter. The only answer ( and I one I was given here actually) is to keep all outside areas free of clutter and litter, hard pave or gravel rather than have garden near the house and thus keep them away from the house.

Putting sacks out is tantamount to putting up B&B signs for the local widlife population.

[Huge]

Because the costs reflect the difficulty of obtaining whatever it is (or at least, should). If obtaining 'x' new is cheaper than obtaining it by recycling, then the recycling is pointless. Take paper. Recycled paper is more expensive than new, not as good quality and requires nasty chemicals (bleach) for recycling. Where's the point in that? Ditto glass. There is no market for glass cullet in the UK. All recycled glass has to be used for landfill or road surfacings. Where's the point in that?

There are exceptions, such as aluminium cans, so long as you neither wash them out, nor drive them to the recycling centre.

The situation is *much* more complicated than "recycling good, new bad".

[Huge]

[20 lines snipped]

I have a dishwasher.

[11 lines snipped]

Read it somewhere. Happy to be disabused of the notion.

[mich]

So , are you suggesting I put empty cans back into the cupbards Ive taken them out of , that is store them in with my food?

This is something many old ladies do , especially those who are finding it hard to cope independently and are becoming senile. Ive taken many such a poor soul into a care home because her house had been piled high with cans ( all nicely cleaned) and stacked in the kitchen cupboards next to her food supplies. And all nicely cleaned and stacked across the window sills, and in utility areas etc..

Are you now telling me she was just recycling?

Well, I dont want to end up in care because the council send in their grime team when it looks like my cupboards are bing used for storing empty tins.

I am not disputing they take up little room when laid flat or squashed. But still where do you store them?

I 've never kept a paper more than three days. Its usually burned or put in the normal bin and took out weekly. A sack is taking me several weeks to fill

And the council are requiring that they are given FULL SACKS. I cant just send 'um off come hell or high water fortnightly.

My problem is a storage one caused because I dont generate enough waste quickly enough.

[mich]

I agree, it doesnt make sense. And why does junk mail go in with the newspaper but cardboard has to be put seperately?

Why take plastic milk bottles but not plastic lemonade bottles? There are so many exceptions.

[mich]

We have been told we have to clean them before putting them into the sacks, so from the uninitiated why is this counter advantagous to their recycling since thats the purpose?

I think rinsing is going to be a problem for my drains at some point with all the gunge thats now going down the sink plughole, and I am responsible for all the sh*t disposed of on my ground , it doesnt go into the mains sewer. I rely on land drains and septic tank.

[Huge]

Because the people who told you to rinse them haven't considered the whole life cost of the process. Their motivation is to reduce landfill, or to recycle x% of household waste. They don't actually care about recycling 'per se'.

[ray]

Its noisy alright especially when the green plastic container is chucked back into the front from across the road.

[Bluestars]

Probably does on strict economic grounds, but as its marginal I would prefer to see as much material as possible recycled rather than wasted.

When I looked into the local can bank about 3/4 of the cans were aluminium, and at around 650 UKp a tonne scrap value (65p per kilo) I recon they are on to a good thing, especially if the contractor quoted for clearing only steel cans.

Incidently a couple of summers ago it became a nice little earner for those who had the time to go round collecting aluminium beverage cans and weighing them in.

Roger

[Bob Eager]

But if you have a dishwasher, that not-so-clean water is inaccessible.

I don't mind recycling....but my council have made it MUCH less practical to do.

[Mary Fisher]

Don't be silly. I'm saying that you are prepared to store your cans etc. full and don't complain about lack of space yet you're complaining of lack of space to store them empty.

Oh - not old men?

especially those who are finding it

MANY???

I don't believe that you've taken many old women into care because of this. That hyperbole loses you all the waning credibility you had.

I think you said that you had bags supplied? But it might have been someone else.

We don't have them, full stop. No waste.

Contributing to the CO2 layer.

Wasting a resource.

In that case it wouldn't take up much room hanging in an outhouse.

Have you thought about co-operating with your neighbours to fill sacks so that they would be full and removed more quickly?

That doesn't make sense, you know.

No, you don't know. Nor do you want to know.

Life has problems but most of them are soluble. Where there's a will there's a way. You've been offered several solutions by contributors to this ng but you don't seem to want to solve your perceived problem.

You'll just have to live with it.

Mary

[geoff]

In message , mich writes

He might have had an excuse to be ignorant of the facts, you don't

[Huge]

[20 lines snipped]

Hear, hear. Couldn't agree more.

Same again.

[Huge]

Why? If it doesn't work on strict economic grounds, it doesn't work on any other.