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We are all becoming increasingly aware of climate change; in fact, it’s hard to turn on the TV or listen to the radio without hearing a story about how our communities are impacting the natural environment. Sometimes, this can feel overwhelming, but the good news is that there are many actions we can take - and recycling together is one action we can all do to help. Every piece of material we produce impacts our climate for better or for worse, so the more material we recycle right, the more positive our impact can be.

By recycling right, you will help to keep raw materials in the ground, reduce air and water pollution, conserve energy and help with the fight against climate change. I was shocked to learn that every year the UK throws away five million tonnes of plastic. Not only does this create a staggering amount of waste, but it also uses up vital natural resources as it takes 250ml of oil to produce a single one litre plastic water bottle.  This means it’s even more important to make sure you place your plastic bottles in the recycling bin at home.

With Recycle Week 2022 taking place next week (17 to 23 October), it’s a great time to spread the word about the importance of recycling right. We know that people in Nottinghamshire want to recycle, but despite our best collective efforts we’re still seeing a large proportion of items that can’t be recycled locally ending up in the recycling stream. When this happens it causes contamination, which can spoil a whole lorry load of recycling and mean that we cannot recycle it.

Although we offer consistent mixed dry recycling collections across Nottinghamshire, we know that local recycling schemes offer different services up and down the country. This, as well as conflicting messages on packaging mean that it can be confusing for even the keenest recyclers to know exactly which products belong in which bin, while even more admit to “wishcycling” or putting items in the recycling that they know are not accepted locally. With this in mind we want to encourage people to recycle more of the right things, more often. That’s why we have teamed up with our waste and recycling partner, Veolia to produce a new recycling checker that will help Nottinghamshire residents to make sure they are putting the correct items in their recycling bins.

The recycling checker launches next week in the MyNotts app, so make sure you have downloaded the latest version for this exciting update. You can find out how to download the MyNotts app on the Nottinghamshire County Council website: MyNotts app | Nottinghamshire County Council

Councillor Mike Adams, Environment Ambassador and Deputy Cabinet Member for Transport and Environment at Nottinghamshire County Council