Recycling plastics and cardboard

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North

You can now recycle all plastic bottles and flattened cardboard at your local mini recycling site.

What do I do with plastic bottles?

When you bring plastic bottles, please remember to wash, squash and put the lids back on. This means we can fit more plastic in to the bins and the lorries,reducing the number of trips that we need to make to transport them.

What do I do with cardboard?

It must be clean and flattened, to help save space in the bins. All plastic and polystyrene packaging that come with the cardboard must be removed to avoid contamination. Tetra-Pak and other metallic coated cardboards, such as fruit juice cartons, can not be recycled at these mini recycling sites.

Where can I take them to?

You can recycle all other plastics at your local Household Recycling Centres.

Contact Details

Email: wasteandrecyclingnorth@wiltshire.gov.uk
Telephone: 01249 706352
Postal Address:
Customer Services
Wiltshire Council
Monkton Park
Chippenham
SN15 1ER
In Person:
Wiltshire Council
Monkton Park
Chippenham
SN15 1ER

Some services differ based on where you live. Why is this?

South

New blue-lidded bins for fortnightly collection of plastic bottles and cardboard

• Plastic bottles
• Cardboard

We have now starting delivering the 180 litre bins for plastic bottles and cardboard. To keep the number of vehicles needed to a minimum we will be collecting plastic bottles and cardboard in the same bin.

For more information download our full Guide to the new waste and recycling service (PDF 549kb)

Wiltshire Council in partnership with Hills Waste Solutions and Wiltshire Wildlife Trust have created a video about the blue lidded plastic bottle and cardboard collection in South Wiltshire. To view the video please visit www.recycleforwiltshire.com

Plastic bottles

What plastic bottles will be recycled?

• soft drink bottles
• milk bottles
• washing up liquid bottles
• shampoo bottles
• household cleanser bottles

Please do not put other plastics in the recycling bin, because there are different types of plastic, some of which are more easily recycled than others. There are also differences in the commercial markets for different types of plastic.

Plastic products carry a number (usually 1 – 7) in a triangle indicating the type of material they are made from. Types 1 – 3 are the most easily recyclable.

Bottles make up the majority of all household plastics and are virtually all type 1, 2 or 3. Although other plastic products, for example food trays and yoghurt pots, may be type 1, 2 or 3, many are not. The lorry-loads of plastics sent to the commercial re-processors need to be free from ‘contamination’ by other types of plastic, therefore the advice is simply to recycle plastic bottles. If the re-processor finds a significant proportion of other plastic products in the load, they are likely to reject it, making everyone’s recycling efforts a wasted exercise.

Please help by only putting plastic bottles in the recycling bin.

Plastic waste taken to one of the major household recycling centres at Salisbury and Amesbury can contain any type 1,2 or 3 plastics as these are sorted on site by Hills Waste staff.

Cardboard

Cardboard is collected on the same day as your black box is emptied, but please put your cardboard alongside the box not inside.

What cardboard will be collected for recycling?

• cereal boxes
• corrugated cardboard
• cardboard sleeves
• paper fibre egg boxes
• clean frozen food boxes
• cardboard tubes (e.g. from toilet rolls or kitchen rolls)
• shoes boxes
• greetings cards

Please ensure all plastic packaging has been removed and boxes flattened.

What cardboard will NOT be collected for recycling?

• take-away food packaging
• disposable drinks cups
• waxed cartons e.g. Tetra Paks (fruit juice, UHT milk etc)
• waxed boxes or packaging
• boxes containing food remnants e.g. pizza boxes
• boxes with plastic windows (unless all plastic is removed)
• books

Why can’t cardboard and paper be collected together as it used to be?

Paper and cardboard are used for different products and commercial re-processors, who buy the material from councils, require them to be collected and delivered separately as it is expensive to separate and therefore has a lower market value. If it is not collected separately, we risk having to dump mixed material in landfill.

Will there be a problem when cardboard is collected with plastic bottles?

No. From trials undertaken, separating plastic bottles from cardboard is a simpler and quicker process than separating paper from cardboard.

Why won't you collect waxed cartons (eg Tetra-paks) in the blue-lidded bins?

Recovering materials from these products is a very different process to other cardboard based materials and we cannot collect these as part of our kerbside scheme. However, recycling skips for waxed cartons are now available at the Household Recycling Centres on the Churchfields Industrial Estate, Salisbury and at Mills Way, Amesbury.

Contact Details

Email: wasteandrecyclingsouth@wiltshire.gov.uk
Telephone: 01722 434319 or 01722 434320
Postal Address:
Environmental Services
Wiltshire Council
PO Box 2126
Salisbury
SP2 2DJ
In Person:
Wiltshire Council
27-29 Milford Street
Salisbury
Wiltshire
SP1 2AP

Some services differ based on where you live. Why is this?

East

How to recycle plastic bottles

Recycling one plastic bottle will save enough energy to light a 60W light bulb for over 6 hours, yet in the UK only 3% of our plastic is recycled. Plastic is lightweight and very bulky, making it difficult to collect economically and efficiently from the kerbside.

In East Wiltshire, plastic bottles can be taken to the Household Recycling Centres at Everleigh, and Hopton Industrial Estate, Devizes, where they will be recycled and made into a variety of products including carrier bags, building materials and even clothes!

The Household Recycling Centres will take plastics made of PET (1), HDPE (2) or PVC (3). To identify what your plastic bottles and containers are made of, look on the base for the correct recycling symbol. This symbol may consist of triangles and numbers, letters and triangles, or simply letters, as shown below.

Type: PET - Polyethylene terephthalate

• fizzy drink bottles
• cooking oil bottles
• cordial bottles
• oven-ready meal trays

Type: HDPE - High-density polyethylene

• milk bottles
• washing up liquid bottles
• shampoo and conditioner bottles
• fabric conditioner bottles
• household cleaning fluid bottles

Type: PVC - Polyvinyl chloride

• cling film
• food trays
• shampoo and conditioner bottles

These plastics below cannot be recycled

Type: LDPE - Low density polyethylene

• bin liners
• carrier bags

Type: PP - Polypropylene

• margarine tubs
• microwave ready meal trays
• plant pots

Type:PS - Polystyrene

• foam meat or fish trays
• burger boxes
• yoghurt pots

All other plastics

• any plastic which does not fit into any of the groups above

All the plastic collected is baled and sent to Preston for sorting. The HDPE (2) bottles are made into drainpipes, compost bins and recycling boxes. The PET (1) bottles are made into clothes and carpets, whilst the PVC (3) collected is turned into Christmas trees and toys.

To make plastics recycling a success, please ensure that you only recycle these types of plastic in the recycling banks. Any other plastic or other material may contaminate the entire collection. Please make sure all bottles are washed and squashed to save on space, and remove all tops.

Unfortunately, we are unable to collect other types of plastic such as yoghurt pots or margarine tubs as they are made from a range of polymers, which are much more difficult to identify. Therefore if it doesn’t say PET (1), HDPE (2) or PVC (3) on it, it can’t be recycled.

Plastic Carrier Bags

Around 80 million carrier bags are used in Wiltshire each year with most being sent to landfill. Try to reuse plastic bags as much as possible, or invest in a ‘bag for life’. Some supermarkets also offer a plastic bag recycling point.

Contact Details

Email: customerserviceseast@wiltshire.gov.uk
Telephone: 01380 734849
Postal Address:
Wiltshire Council
Browfort
Bath Road
Devizes
Wiltshire
SN10 2AT
In Person:
Wiltshire Council
Browfort
Bath Road
Devizes
Wiltshire
SN10 2AT

Some services differ based on where you live. Why is this?

West

Currently in West Wiltshire there are two ways to recycle plastic.

1. The mini recycling centres accept plastic bottles only. For information about which sites can accept plastic bottles, please see mini recycling centres page.
2. The Household Recycling Centres (HRCs) can accept grades 1, 2 and 3 of plastic, which are the highest grades. The grade is shown by the triangles on the plastic product, please see the symbols below as a guide. We are currently unable to collect grades 4 and 5 as they are too low-grade and there is no market for the recycled product.

What you can recycle

There is a robust processing market for these high quality plastic items within the UK, meaning they do not have to be shipped abroad to be processed. The plastic is chipped, melted and cleaned in Hemswell, Leicester and then sold to be made into products such as water butts, bin liners and window frames.

Type: PET - Polyethylene terephthalate

• fizzy drink bottles
• cooking oil bottles
• cordial bottles

Type: HDPE - High-density polyethylene

• milk containers
• washing up liquid bottles
• shampoo and conditioner bottles
• fabric conditioner bottles
• household cleaning fluid bottles

Type: PVC - Polyvinyl chloride

• shampoo and conditioner bottles

These plastics below cannot be recycled

Type: LDPE - Low density polyethylene

• bin liners
• carrier bags

Type: PP - Polypropylene

• margarine tubs
• microwave ready meal trays
• plant pots

Type:PS - Polystyrene

• foam meat or fish trays
• burger boxes
• yoghurt pots

Plastic Carrier Bags

Around 80 million carrier bags are used in Wiltshire each year with most being sent to landfill. Try to reuse plastic bags as much as possible, or invest in a ‘bag for life’. Some supermarkets also offer a plastic bag recycling point.

Contact Details

Email: wasteandrecyclingwest@wiltshire.gov.uk
Telephone: 01225 776655
Fax: 01225 770316
Postal Address:
Waste and Recycling
Wiltshire Council
Bradley Road
Trowbridge
BA14 0RD
In Person:
Wiltshire Council
Bradley Road
Trowbridge
BA14 0RD

Some services differ based on where you live. Why is this?