Recycle Week in Westbury

This year’s Recycle Week  took place from 22nd to 28th June, when Westbury residents were being encouraged to recycle. 

You were probably aware of this if you visited Westbury library during that week and saw the display in the entrance, or came across the information stand on Monday in Morrisons, where residents were being asked to pledge to start recycling something they don’t already.

Bitham Brook School got involved too and on Wednesday 24th June went on a trip, organised by Wiltshire Wildlife Trust and Hills Waste Solutions, to the Landfill Site and Materials Recycling Facility near Calne, where all the area’s recycling is taken to be sorted before being transported to be processed.

Jessica Thimbleby of WWT said, “You can make a difference to the amount of rubbish sent to landfill – which costs us and the environment – by recycling around the home.  How about making a couple of changes to help you recycle more?  Here’s some myth-busting, reminders and handy tips:

Myth: Recycling is too much hassle! Fact: Recycling today is easy:

• You can make a dedicated area for recycling in your kitchen, for example a separate bin or box

• Please wash out your glass bottles, jars and tins (otherwise they get really smelly) – you could pop them in the dishwasher or rinse them out with dirty washing-up water

• Wash and squash your plastic bottles.  All other clean plastics including margarine containers, yoghurt pots, packaging and rigid plastics including toys and garden furniture can be recycled at the Household Recycle Centre where they also take Tetra-pak cartons.

Myth: Most recycling ends up in landfill. Fact: In 2014/15 in West Wiltshire, Hills Waste Solutions collected and sorted 30,382 tonnes of recycling which is sold, composted or re-used.  Sending rubbish to landfill costs £80 per tonne and takes up limited space so it’s in no-ones interest to do this.

Myth: Recycling a few jars and cans makes no difference. Fact: Recycling saves energy that would be used to create new products and makes best use of limited natural resources – if everyone in England recycled one more aluminium can each week 45,994 tonnes would stay out of landfill.

Recycled materials are valuable commodities on the world market and there are many recycling factories in the UK, reprocessing millions of tonnes of material every year.

Glass recycling: Do you put all your glass containers in the black box?  Recycling one glass bottle saves enough energy to power a TV for 15 minutes.  After it is collected the glass is taken to be crushed, melted and moulded or blown into new bottles and jars or glass wool insulation for homes.

Paper recycling: In the UK we use 12.5 million tonnes of paper each year!  Paper produced from virgin raw material uses more energy (70%) and water than if we recycle our unwanted paper.  If you put your waste paper out for recycling it can end up as a newspaper – newsprint contains around 78% recycled paper – or corrugated packaging which is made of nearly 100% recycled material.

Plastic recycling: Recycled plastic can be made into: bin liners and carrier bags, plastic bottles, flooring and window frames, fencing and garden furniture, water butts, garden sheds and composters, fleeces and fibre filling for sleeping bags and duvets.”

See www.recyclenow. com for more information on what you can recycle where. Wiltshire Wildlife Trust, in partnership with Wiltshire Council, are working in the Westbury area to encourage people to produce less rubbish and re-use and recycle more.

If you are passionate about recycling, WWT would love to hear from you – please contact Jessica Thimbleby at jessicat@wiltshirewildlife.org or call 01380 736077.