WHAT a difference six months make! The tonnage of recycling collected in recycling bins being contaminated by other rubbish has dropped by over half since March.
An audit of Thurrock’s recycling earlier this year showed that nearly 17 per cent of the recycling collected in blue bins was contaminated, and therefore unable to be recycled.
That figure – following a similar audit in September – is now just 7.6 per cent.
Cllr Victoria Holloway, Thurrock’s cabinet member for Environment, said: “This is tremendous news in so many ways. The vast majority of us try to recycle as much as we can, but one person’s contaminated bin can mean a whole lorry load having to be thrown into a tip.
“This not only harms our recycling figures and reduces all of our efforts to improve the environment, but it also costs us – as council tax payers – because the cost of landfill is ever-increasing.
“The council’s team has been working hard at improving the figures, inspecting each blue bin carefully before taking it to the lorry and tagging those that are contaminated with a bright, yellow tag which explains why it was not taken.
“These have also been followed up by letters and face-to-face meetings between staff and residents to explain what the problem is and how it can be corrected.”
She added: “I would like to thank everyone involved in helping to reduce the amount of contamination in our bins – keep putting the right things in the right bin!.”
