WE ARE REDUCING the amount we throw away. At least that is what a survey conducted by the East Riding Council tells us.
The survey of the waste in the green wheelie bins involved a selection of bins being chosen at random and the waste sorted by hand, weighed and analysed.
While the amount of waste in the green bins was down, nearly a third of it was food, much of it still in unopened packaging.
A further 7.5% of the waste was paper, cans and plastic bottles which should have been put in the blue bins for recycling (this compares with 10% in a similar survey undertaken in November 2007).
Two significant areas of waste in the green bins were baby nappies and cardboard. Disposable nappies made up over 4% of the waste. Cardboard was 5%, but this is expected to decline after the new brown bin collection service is rolled out across the East Riding towards the end of the year.
Councillor Symon Fraser, East Riding Councillor and Cabinet Member for environment and planning, said:
These surveys are helping us determine which recycling and composting facilities and services will best help our residents. As a result of the earlier surveys, we delivered the brown bins for garden waste and last month announced the future collection of food waste and cardboard.”
The East Riding of Yorkshire Council is carrying out a series of bin surveys between now and 2012.
Current advice on what to put in brown bins;
Current advice on what to put in blue bins.
Source: East Riding Council Press Release