Palmerston North City Council waste minimisation officer Ariadne Santos with Judith Lacy's recycling bin. Photo / Judith Lacy
OPINION
Three brown bottles and one shower puff.
That’s all I allow in my shower these days as it makes cleaning the thing easier. Cleaning what cleans you does my head in.
None of those brown bottles - shampoo, conditioner and body wash - belong in the recycling bin.
It was the biggest shock from Palmerston North City Council waste minimisation officer Ariadne Santos’ audit of my bin.
Coloured PET (polyethylene terephthalate) is not in demand to be recycled into another product and that includes my three brown bottles.
From February 1, the rules about what can be put in your recycling bin changed nationwide.
In a sentence, you can no longer put lids, caps or spray cans in your wheelie bin. You can put the unattached lid of a can inside and squeeze it so the lid stays inside. There are some helpful pictures on the council’s website.
It turns out I’m still not au fait with changes from the last round of tweaks.
Such is the nature of recycling but it doesn’t mean you, me or councils should stop trying.
Ariadne found four items in my bin that shouldn’t be there - one green PET bottle, one brown PET bottle, a black tray from a TV dinner (that I shouldn’t have bought anyway) and a lid I’d forgotten doesn’t belong in the bin.
She praised the lack of food waste and how clean everything was. That’s right - I’m not a rinse girl, I wash my recycling like it is going back in the cupboard then wait for it to dry before putting it in the bin. There is someone at the other end who does the sorting.
I made the most of having Ariadne in my kitchen. Staples such as in those newspaper magazines are fine as are envelopes. Pizza box bottoms with a bit of oil soaked in are okay but not leftover pizza. Pump tops from hand sanitiser and hand wash bottles go in the rubbish.
Ariadne also gave some helpful advice. Keep each item separate, eg. no can in a cereal box. Soft plastics (items that can be scrunched into a ball) don’t belong in the wheelie bin so yes to the cracker box but no to the plastic tray.
Confession. I remember reading you can take Tetra Pak to the Ferguson Street Recycling Centre but I’d never done it. Think cartoons of fruit juice, stock and almond and soy milk.
Ariadne reminded me and I’m a convert. A video on the council’s website shows how to prepare the Tetra Pak for recycling.
Ariadne offered to check my rubbish bag but I wasn’t going to subject her to used sanitary products so I gathered up a collection of other items I put in there. Nothing should have been in the recycling bin. A big tick for moi.
Plastic with the numbers 1, 2 and 5 in the triangle is wanted for recycling. But good golly they are hard to see.
Recycling is fraught as it relies on people doing the right thing and councils being able to find markets for the products.
As a wise person said to me last year, we can’t recycle our way out of plastic waste. Buying less of it in the first place and demanding food producers use less are good places to start.
The council has updated its wheelie bin flyer, which you can get from its website or customer service centre. Keep it on your fridge to remind you.
So as the kids settle back into learning, update your recycling knowledge. I know it’s not fun but neither is plastic pollution.
As for those brown bottles, I’m pondering.
Judith Lacy is editor of the Manawatū Guardian
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