Recycling Tips

Published on by Emma Clarke

Recycling turns our waste materials into new useful products. This reduces the use of finite raw materials, saves energy and helps control air, water and land pollution. Recycling is a group effort. We all have our part to play to not only recycle as much waste as possible but to also make sure our recycling is properly sorted. Recycling that includes non-recyclable items or is contaminated with food waste can end up in landfill. It only takes a few minutes to rinse out plastic, glass and tin containers and sort our cardboard to avoid a disposal problem that will live with future generations for hundreds or even thousands of years.

We have done up a new page on recycling tips which includes information on:

  • What can go in your Green Bin?
  • Make sure you know what shouldn’t be in your recycling bin
  • How to lighten your Recycling Bin
  • What can you put in your Brown Bin?
  • How to lighten your Brown Bin
  • What can you put in your Black Bin?
  • How to lighten your General Waste Bin
  • What can you do with Glass, Cans & Textiles?
  • What can you do with electrical, electronic and battery waste (WEEE) Items?
  • What can you do with your hazardous household waste?
  • What to do with your large items?
  • Recycling & Waste Information Websites
  • Go Green and use less chemical downloadable guides

Go to http://jra.me/environment/recycling-tips/ to read all this information!

Did you know?
 It’s easy to think that prevention and using your recycling bin doesn’t make much difference. Just look at the facts and think again.

  • You can make a bicycle out of 650 recycled aluminium cans.
  • If you recycle one aluminium can today, it can be made into a new can, get filled and be back on the shelf in just six weeks.
  • Approximately 75% of the aluminium ever produced is still in circulation today.
  • Each ton of recycled paper can save 17 trees, 2.2 cubic metres of landfill space and 7,000 gallons of water.
  • It is possible to recycle one sheet of printer paper up to 7 times.
  • Producing plastic products from recycled plastics reduces energy requirements by 66%.
  • Recycling just 1 tonne of plastics saves 1,000–2,000 gallons of petroleum.
  • It takes up to 500 years for plastic to decompose.
  • One million tonnes of food waste is produced in Ireland annually. That’s enough food waste to fill Croke Park two and a half times! Imagine that.
  • Over ⅓ of the food produced globally goes to waste
  • The average household in Ireland is responsible for 1 Ton of Food Waste, thats somewhere between €400 and €1000 per year!
  • All the world’s nearly one billion hungry people could be fed on less than a quarter of the food that is wasted in the US, UK and Europe.
  • An area larger than China is used to grow food that is never eaten.
  • 25% of the world’s freshwater supply is used to grow food that is never eaten.
  • If food waste were a country it would be the 3rd largest emitter of greenhouse gases (after China & the USA).
  • In most developed countries, over half of all food waste takes place in the home.
  • Glass is 100% recyclable and can be recycled endlessly without loss in quality or purity.Color sorting makes a difference, too. Glass manufacturers are limited in the amount of mixed color-cullet (called “3 mix”) they can use to manufacture new containers. Separating recycled container glass by color allows the industry to ensure that new bottles match the color standards required by glass container customers
  • Over a ton of natural resources are saved for every ton of glass recycled.
  • Recycled glass can be substituted for up to 95% of raw materials
  • Glass never decomposes, making it the worst candidate for landfill entombment! Experts suggest that it would take 1 million years for a simple glass bottle to completely break down under normal landfill conditions.
  • When you recycle one single glass bottle, enough energy is saved to illuminate a 100-watt light bulb for four hours or power a computer or television for close to half an hour.
  • Glass containers for food and beverages are 100% recyclable, but not with other types of glass. Other kinds of glass, like windows, ovenware, Pyrex, crystal, etc. are manufactured through a different process. If these materials are introduced into the glass container manufacturing process, they can cause production problems and defective containers.
  • Information is from https://www.mywaste.ie/did-you-know