Recycling top tips!

Wash and Squash

Please only put clean items in your green bin. Save water by rinsing your items in leftover washing up water once you’ve done the dishes. Once dry, squash bottles and tins to make more space in your black bin.

No plastic bags please! 

Please do not put your recycling into plastic bags as they cannot be recycled and neither can the items in the plastic bag. If you do collect items in a plastic bag, tip them loose into your green bin and put the plastic bag into your black bin if you do not plan to reuse it again.

What if I’ve got it wrong?

Our collection teams regularly check green recycling bins to make sure items that cannot be recycled do not get collected. They may attach an information tag to bins that contain wrong items.

Ignore those symbols!

Many items have lots of confusing symbols printed on them, none of which will accurately tell you if it can be recycled in Winchester.

Reuse your pots, tubs and trays

Plastic pots, tubs and trays cannot be recycled in your green bin. Recycling collected from your green bin is taken to a Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) for sorting. These types of plastics used to make pots, tubs and trays cannot be successfully sorted by the equipment at the MRF.

Most containers can be reused around the house for everything from freezing leftovers in, to storing nails in the shed and even keeping toys tidy.