How and what can I place in my recycling bin?

Some points to remember when preparing your household recyclables are:

• Remove the lids: plastic bottle lids are usually made from different materials to the bottle itself and can’t yet be easily recycled. Steel jar lids can be recycled, but remove them before you put them in the recycling bin.
• Give them a quick rinse: when it comes to recycling, it doesn’t need to be spotless or have the label removed, but to cut down on vermin and odour problems in your bin, make sure they are reasonably clean.
• Flatten your cardboard: the machinery that sorts your recyclables is far more effective if cardboard boxes are flattened out. Bundling newspapers together can also hamper the sorting process, so keep them separate.
• Separate the component parts of recyclables: if something contains components of different types of materials, separate them out before recycling. For example, if junk mail is wrapped in plastic, be sure to remove the wrapping and put it in the waste bin before recycling the paper.

For more information on household recycling see zero waste sa recycling made easy fact sheet and visit the Recycle Right pages on their website.

Source: www.zerowaste.sa.gov.au