Could compartment bins in the home help you to recycle more?

Could Compartment Bins in the Home Help You Recycle?

If you think you could recycle more if you had a different set up, then why not try and make those changes. Compartment bins are increasingly available and make it so easy to recycle – everything is in one place, you just need to choose the right section to place your rubbish and recycling. You can find compartment bins with different sections too – one for rubbish, one for organic waste and another for mixed recycling. If you live in an area where you have to separate your recycling, why not buy a compartment bin just for your recycling, so you can have sections for glass, plastic and paper, for example. Not only will it be neat and tidy, it will also make recycling easier for you.

It might also be worth thinking about buying a separate bin for paper if you have an office or an area where you work at home. All too often it is easy to be lazy when it comes to recycling and simply throw things in the bin that is nearest to us at the time. If you have a paper bin in your study or near your desk, you will be much more likely to recycle all your used paper.

Buying a compartment bin will depend on what type and how much rubbish you get though. If you have a lot or rubbish, you may need more than one bin; one for general waste, the other for recycling. If you mainly recycle paper and plastic, then you will find a three-section bin will suit your purposes and anything else you recycle can be dealt with on that odd occasion. Some bins even come with five sections in one bin, so there really is no excuse to not recycle.

Compartment bins are also useful in offices, so if you think your work could recycle more, consider speaking to the office manager about getting compartment bins installed in communal areas. This makes it easier for people to recycle if they are in a hurry, or not willing to make a detour to a recycling bin when they need to recycle paper or perhaps empty plastic cups, which are often wasted in workplaces.

The final place you might benefit from having a compartment bin is in the bathroom, where plastic bottles can often get left out of recycling by being thrown in the non-recyclable bin. Having the option to split your waste will undoubtedly guarantee that you recycle more and spending a little bit extra on a compartment bin will benefit the environment in the long run.

A lot of the above may seem like spoon-feeding the obvious to a certain degree, but when you look at the image below you will see why it is actually so important. As a nation we do not recycle enough, there has been a greater move towards recycling in recent years with the introduction of green recycle boxes and bi-weekly wheelie bin collections to encourage the use of the green boxes.

The image below shows the average composition of a UK wheelie bin and as you can see it does not make for pleasant reading. 83% of what is in the average bin could in fact be recycled but currently it is not.