Recycling facilities

Dry recycling

The City and District of St Albans currently offers a fortnightly kerbside collection service for all the residential properties in the district where practicable i.e. all houses, but not flats, sheltered accommodation, etc (see section on flats below). All participating residents are given three 55 litre recycling boxes (free of charge)  in which to put their recyclables; one for newspaper and magazines, one for cans (steel and aluminium), empty aerosols, plastic bottles and clean aluminium foil and one for glass, bottles and jars. The glass collected will not be kept colour separated, but collected mixed.

Additional recycling boxes can be purchased from the Council at a cost of £3 each (while stocks are available).

All residents are provided with an annual calendar in ‘Recycling News’ indicating when their collections will take place, this will be delivered during December.

Yes please

• Yes please to: glass bottles and jars

• Yes please to: Newspapers, magazines, catalogues, white telephone directories, junk mail and yellow pages.

• Yes please to: All cans - food and pet food as well as drinks cans and aerosols. Please wash and squash your cans. There is no need to remove any paper labels. Please include your clean aluminium foil. Please empty the aerosols before putting out for collection. All plastic bottles including lids, please leave these on the bottle. Coloured bottles that have contained household cleaners, washing up liquid, bleach, shampoo etc. are acceptable.

No thanks

This Council does not want:

• No thanks to: Yoghurt pots, ice cream or margarine tubs, punnets or film or any other form of plastic sheets.  It is strictly plastic bottles only.

Green waste = garden waste, food waste – cooked and raw, shredded paper and cardboard, all these items can be placed in your green wheeled bin. For a comprehensive list of what can and can't go into the green bin please go to www.recyclingforapremier.com

Green waste recycling

Green waste is collected on the alternate week to your refuse as part of the 'twin bin' system. Green waste = garden waste, food waste – cooked and raw, shredded paper and cardboard, all these items can be placed in your green wheeled bin. For a comprehensive list of what can and can't go into the green bin please go to www.recyclingforapremier.com.

Those properties not suitable for wheeled bins are issued with two reusable bags and can request a 23 litre kitchen caddy for food waste which is put out for collection next to the reusable bags.

Home composting

Part of the Councils recycling strategy is to promote home composting. Subsidised home composters are available through the County Council scheme, so if you are interested and would like a leaflet, please contact this office, ring the free trial hotline 0845 076 0223 or go to www.recyclenow.com/compost

Processing of materials

All the materials collected are taken to Pearce Recycling where they are stored, sorted and baled as necessary before being loaded and sent to processors throughout the UK.

All collected refrigerators and freezers from the bulky waste collection service are sent to specialist contractors to have their C.F.C. components removed before disposal. All re-useable units are renovated and sold. TV sets, PC monitors, sunbeds etc which are now classified as hazardous waste and other electrical equipment are also separated during the collection of bulky waste and stored prior to collection by a specialist company. The tonnages of materials collected by this Council and sent to processors is as follows:-

Recycling in flats, sheltered accommodation etc.

The Council's kerbside recycling scheme relies on an edge of boundary collection, i.e. the boxes are placed close to the boundary. This makes the collection of materials using recycling boxes from flats, sheltered accommodation, etc. impractical.

The Council is however committed to ensuring that all residents of flats etc and schools have access to recycling facilities. This Council is prepared to offer wheeled recycling bins to such properties for the collection of recyclable materials.

As long as there is a hard standing for the recycling bin, reasonable vehicle access and the bin can be wheeled to it, then the Council can arrange for recycling bins to be provided and emptied, free of charge. The bins can be of varying sizes to suit the location and we can collect the same recycling listed above in 'Yes please'.

Enquiries to go on the above scheme – to Louise Palmer on 01727-819428 or e-mail louise.palmer@stalbans.gov.uk.

Junior and Infant schools are also entitled to 3 compost bins and 10 kitchen caddies f.o.c., for details please contact advisor@wrap.org.uk 

Collection of materials from commercial premises

The Council does not provide a collection service for recyclables/re-useables from commercial premises. Enquires for this service can however be made by visiting the waste aware website.

Re-useable Nappy Scheme

This Council currently run an incentive scheme to promote the use of cotton nappies instead of disposable. This is to reduce the 8 million per day thrown away every day in the UK and which go to landfill or incineration.

The Councils incentive scheme offers £60 to families using reusable nappies. We also operate a trial kit service for carers to borrow f.o.c.

To arrange a loan of a kit or for further details of the incentive scheme please contact Louise Palmer at these offices or contact the Wasteaware website for an application form. Please also visit for information and advice.

For more information contact louise.palmer@stalbans.gov.uk or Louise Palmer 01727 819428.

Enquiries

For general enquiries regarding recycling or for a free leaflet on recycling or subsidised composters and waste prevention, please contact us on 01727 819285.

Household waste sites/Recyling sites

There are three household waste recycling centres provided by HCC along with a number of recycling sites provided by the District Council, for more information please visit www.recyclingforapremier.com