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Sorting your recycling into the right box or bag can really help to speed up collections for our recycling crews especially as boxes can often be a little fuller after the end of year festivities.
Remember to check that you’re put the right thing in the right box. And if you have lots of extra recycling, you can take it to one of our recycling sites, or if you have space, please store it for a following week.
Bright blue bag: Plastic bottles, pots, tubs, trays, metal tins and cans, foil, empty aerosols (for example for deodorant or whipped cream, but not camping gas canisters) and empty toothpaste tubes.
Avoid contamination No plastic bags or wrappers (unless you’re in the part of our plastic bags and wrapper pilot), no broken glass in boxes, and no mixed‑material pouches at kerbside.
If you are part of the plastics bag and wrappers collection pilot then you will have been given special collection bags, these should go in your box and not your reusable bright blue bag.
Green box: glass bottles and jars and cartons (rinse; lids back on; no broken glass, Pyrex or glassware).
Black box: paper and card (tear up large boxes)
Batteries, vapes, and small electricals can all be recycled at the kerbside, recycling sites or check out Recycle Your electricals campaign for local collection points.
Batteries: put in a small tied clear bag and place on top of the boxes; small electricals: put in a separate, untied bag so crews can check contents; vapes should be bagged separately. Or drop them at any recycling site.
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Replace metal jar lids and bottle tops before putting glass in the green box. Doing this helps to stop small materials getting lost as boxes are emptied.
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Squash plastic bottles and put caps back on so crews can fit more into the trucks, making their rounds more efficient.
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Scrunch foil into a ball (combine small sweet wrappers with larger pieces) .
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Separate food from packaging before using the caddy; avoid smells by using your weekly collection.
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Use the battery or electricals kerbside collection system, bagged correctly, to prevent fires at recycling facilities.
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It’s the perfect time to sign up for a Garden Waste collection.
Signing up provides a convenient way to get your garden waste recycled. You can include grass cuttings, flowers and plants, hedge trimmings, leaves, small branches and sawdust.
If you subscribe before 1 April 2026, its just £73.50 per year for a fortnightly wheeled bin collection. Or for a pay-as-you-go service, you can buy packs of 10 compositable sacks for £36.50 and request collections when needed.
Garden waste is turned into soil improver right here in Somerset and is available to buy at all of Somerset’s 16 Recycling Sites.
Subscribe to the Garden Waste collection service online.
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Image courtesy of Daniel G via Unsplash
Think you know your recycling? Not everything you hear is true! Some common myths can lead to wasted effort, or worse, contamination that stops good materials being recycled. Here are the facts you need to keep your recycling on track and Somerset’s system running smoothly.
 We’re reminding residents not to place gas canisters in your kerbside recycling or rubbish. Last year our teams narrowly avoided catastrophic fires at our sorting facilities, but the risk of a fire still remains high. You can help us by not putting gas canisters in the recycling or rubbish bins.
Take small gas canisters to any of Somerset’s 16 recycling sites and speak to staff for safe disposal. Do not place them in any household bins.
Aerosols, such as deodorant or hair spray bottles can be recycled at the kerbside, just add to your blue bag (so long as they are empty). Full or part-used aerosols can be disposed for free at local recycling sites.
• Aerosols (deodorant, hairspray, etc.) contain a smaller amount of ignitable gas, and the bottles are under less pressure.
• Gas canisters are almost all gas - it’s compressed at a high pressure, making it more likely to explode when crushed.
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