As we enter 2023 households across Cornwall are being asked to launch the new year with a recycling resolution.
Cornwall is recycling more now than ever before but, on average, almost a quarter of each black bag collected in Cornwall is made up of recyclable materials.
By recycling more we can be kinder to Cornwall and the planet.
Whether you’re a recycling rookie or you’ve made a start but want to do more, make 2023 the year to do it.
If you need more recycling containers, order them on the Cornwall Council website. If you’re not sure what you can or can’t recycle, visit the online A-Z of recycling.
What happens to your recycling?
A whopping 99% of the recycling that residents put out for the Council to collect is actually reprocessed – either into a product like a meat tray, or pellets from which new products can be manufactured.
Rather than chucking all our recycling in one bin as they do in some other parts of the country, we ask you to sort your household plastics from your glass, paper and cardboard before putting it out for collection.
This home sorting means Cornwall’s recyclables are of a much higher quality than they would be otherwise. This means our recyclables are valuable commodities which we can sell on to reputable companies that reprocess the materials here in the UK that our contractor SUEZ has vetted thoroughly. We do not dump mixed, low quality materials on developing countries
What about rubbish that can’t be recycled?
Black bag rubbish goes to the Cornwall Energy Recovery Centre in St Dennis where it’s incinerated and converted into household electricity. There are no active landfill sites in Cornwall for household waste.
Cllr Carol Mould, portfolio holder for Neighbourhoods at Cornwall Council, said: “By recycling more we can all help tackle the climate emergency. Together we can make a big difference.
“Cornwall is committed to increasing our recycling rates and we are introducing major changes to our collection service to accommodate this.
“You don’t need to do anything now but we’ll be contacting all residents about changes to collection services. You can help prepare for this by looking at what you throw in the bin and recycle as much as you can.
“Please use the festive period to really look at how the things you buy are disposed of and what could be reused or recycled.”
Press release issued on December 30, 2022
