Recycling 101

Definition: Any waste that is recovered and returned or reprocessed to a further useful purpose

Recycling is
- doing yourself and the environment a favour
- the right thing to do ( its your rubbish you are responsible for it)
- really easy! Follow some of the steps below


You will be amazed when you find that you can recycle most of your waste. I've listed some of the basics below:


1 - Find out where you can take your recycle rubbish, unless you are lucky enough to have a service collecting or recycling bins where you live. Look up local government sites and dig around for info (I'll be happy to add your links to this page if you know of sites) Here is some info for Cape Town:

No Standing is a private company offering residential and business pickups in Cape Town for a small fee
Think Twice is an initiative by government to collect household recyclable waste
Wasteplan is another company that has a very convenient drop off at the back of Bayside Center in Tableview. Very convenient because they have a team that will separate everything for you. They also collect for a small fee.
Here is a handy grid with all the depots and contact details in Cape Town at the local government website
More drop off depot information for western cape here. Different depots accept different materials so first find out what you can take where

2 - Store your recycling waste separate to your rubbish. Use separate bins if you have space. Some places will take mixed items and sort them for you but some don't so its a good idea to separate before you drop off.

3 - I wash my recyclable food containers with my dishes. If you are sending your recycling in once a week or less frequently the bin could get smelly and attract unwanted visitors. Also, it's just more hygienic, think about the massive recycling bins that have to store all these items and the people who are working with them. Also some of the recycling companies will not accept very dirty materials.

4 - So What can you recycle?

- Compostable waste : Vegetable, fruit and garden waste ( Make a compost bin or dig a whole in your garden to put it in) (remember not to put any proteins into the compost bin, not only is it not good for your compost bin, but you will also not enjoy the smell of meat going off!)
- Polystyrene
- Tetrapack
- Paper & Cardboard
- Glass
- Metal
- Aluminium & aerosol Cans
- Oils
- Plastic ( there are at least 60 different types )

not to mention any household items that can be given to the needy.

Recycling is only one form of waste minimisation. Others you can practice are reuse and reducing consumption.

You can adopt a Zero tolerance attitude for production of anything that cannot be re-used or recycled, or is costly to the environment.

Recycling starts with YOU. Be your own example to your own environment.

(if you find any of this information to be inaccurate please mail me so that I can rectify it)