Win an ipad 2

How exciting, we at Recycle for Greater Manchester have teamed up with Capital FM to further promote Spikey says…Stick it in the right bin.

Hopefully by now you should be recycling right but to make sure we have launched a radio campaign to spread the message even further. Let us know if you tune into Capital FM and have heard our Stick it in the right bin messages. We want everyone in Greater Manchester to put the right items in their mixed recycling bin, so recycling is more efficient!

Did You Know?

• You can also recycle your foil and aerosols in your mixed recycling.
• You can recycle more by recycling items from upstairs and downstairs, including shampoo and shower gel bottles from your bathroom and aerosols from your bedroom.
• You can only put bottle shaped plastic into your mixed recycling.

See the picture below for all the RIGHT items you can stick in your mixed recycling bin at home:

Want to WIN?

To be in with a chance of winning an Apple iPad 2 with Wi-Fi + 3G 16GB just watch our superb recycle right video and answer the simple recycling question on Capital FM WIN page.

The competition ends  Sunday 11th September.

Waste of a holiday, I don’t think so…

When you are deciding what trips to go on for a day out this summer – the local waste site doesn’t usually spring to mind but that is exactly what 30 people from South Manchester did last Wednesday.

The other members of the Education Team and I opened the doors of the recycling facility and the new education centre at Longley Lane, Sharston, to local people to let them see what goes on at this busy site. 

The group, a mix of local residents, children and grandchildren firstly watched an enjoyable film about where the waste goes in Greater Manchester, then they excitedly kitted up for the site visit in hard hats, high visibility vests, goggles and gloves and walkie talkies!

The main focus of the visit was to show the group how the recycling is sorted in the Materials Recovery Facility. Everyone was amazed at the huge pile of recycling in the tipping hall and the network of conveyor belts moving the glass, plastic bottles and cans through various machines to separate all the different materials. They met the huge magnet that removes the steel cans, little and big eddy that sort out the Aluminium before it is squashed.  Aladdin our ‘fandangled’ computer sorts out the plastic bottles with a laser eye and cyclone who cleans up the glass after the glass breaker and finally all the neat piles of materials ready to be sent off to be made into new things.

The group all enjoyed the visit and were amazed at the quantities of materials and technologies being used to sort them.

If you are thinking  that these 30 people are unusual in how they choose to spend their time – there are at least  another 90 people booked onto our other open days at other waste sites!

Not booked on, then check out our videos of  all the recycling facilities in Greater Manchester and find out how they work on our Education pages , simply log in with a valid e mail and watch at your leisure.

Alison Heaton, Education Officer

Neighbours go head to head in the Stockport Street Challenge

For Recycle Week, Recycle for Greater Manchester and Stockport MBC decided to put residents to the challenge – a Street Recycling Challenge.

In Stockport since we gave almost all households a set of wheelie bins everybody has been recycling more, but there are still recyclables sneaking into refuse bins. Sometimes people aren’t sure which bin it can go in so it ends up in the refuse bin.

It’s also a case of changing long formed habits such as scraping the leftovers off dinner plates into the food caddy which will then be recycled instead of into the refuse bin.

What better way to encourage behaviour change and recycling than a bit of friendly rivalry. Plus an added incentive of a £20 shopping voucher for each winning household, all the residents I spoke to thought it was definitely worth a go!

40 houses on Neston Grove and Rostherne Road are currently going head to head to recycle as much as they can, using their blue, brown and green wheelie bins by the 30^th June. Believe me every bit of recycling really does count.

Did you know that aluminium foil can be recycled with your cans and tins? And Tetrapaks, that’s juice or beverage cartons to you and I, can be recycled with your paper and cardboard? 

Early indications showed Neston Grove to be just in the lead by 3 wheelie bins. That’s about two mown lawns, 100 2 pint plastic milk bottles (washed and squashed!), and 2 full sacks of mail.

Each street is keen to win, and residents are searching the cupboards under the sink for empty cleaning bottles, and clearing out bathroom cabinets of used aerosols. I’ve got a collection of empty shoe boxes if anyone is interested…….

I’ll be sitting in  my office waiting for the rush! Keep checking back for the final results…..

Written by Eleri Jones – Community Recycling Officer, Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council