Week ending Monday 27 October

Todays landfill bag weighed in at 250g.

The landfill bin is now half full, that is from 8 weeks worth of rubbish, including one bag of fire clinker.

The recycling bin was collected this morning and it was only half full from the last 2 weeks.

I have noticed that the main items going into the recycling are, paper & cardboard, plastic (PET) bottles, plastic (HDPE) bottles and food cans.

I do still have a separate collection point for non-collectible plastics which I will be taking to the Recycling Centre on Wednesday, along with a few bits found whilst sorting some things to put on Freecycle.

I also have another carrier bag full of "Tesco" wrappers which do not state plastic origin which will be taken back to the store when I next go.

Week Ending Sunday 19 October 2008

This week, the bag of rubbish going into the landfill bin weighs in at 490g, this is more than has been usual for the last few weeks; but I did go round a few bit bins which haven't been emptied for a couple of weeks.

The landfill bin is now half full and that is since 1 Sept when I joined the Zero Waste week.

Week Ending Sunday 12 October 2008

This weeks bag for the landfill bin is slightly bigger than has been for the last few weeks.

Having checked through the contents, there are 4 widgets from Dave's beer cans, quite a few bottle tops of undistinguishable plastic, and some plastic wrap that is not supermarket own label so I can't send it back to them, and a lamb bone from the joint we had during the week, which although boiled to death for stock as well, has to go into the landfill bin..

Anyhow the bag weighed in at ...... 447g, which is still fairly good.

I will be double checking everything again this week, as I would prefer it to not be above 300g if at all possible.

Week Ending Sunday 5 October

The bag of rubbish today weighed 279g.

This included a salt shaker from some "Geo-organic" sea salt I had purchased ages ago, and thought I could re-fill it; no it is a sealed unit and does not even indicate plastic type for recycling.

Some of the plastic packaging that would normally have gone in has been posted off to Tesco HQ, see copy of letter on http://www.ourgreeneryear.blogspot.com/

Week Ending Sunday 28 September

Our rubbish again weighed 320g this week, and the recycling bin was only half full for the fortnight so something is working somewhere, as this means a decrease in the actual packaging brought into our home.

Zero Waste - Day 21

I have emptied the kitchen bin this morning and we are on 340g of waste to go into the landfill bin. 1 carrier bag again.

The majority of this again is plastic that can't be recycled.

I am really pleased that even though I untaped the bin the boys and Dave have not been putting things into it without thinking.

I do have a couple of ideas up my sleeve to try and reduce some of the plastic meat wrappers and will elaborate as and when they come into practice.

I have a good size box of plastics to take to the HRF or HWRC as the County Council like to call it; and will go armed with my email from the County Council, which states which plastics they accept.

Campaign to the Supermarkets

I wrote a long email yesterday to Tesco head office asking for recyclable and recycled packaging in all their own label/value products or at the very least information on the type of packaging so that as a consumer we can recycle it as we know what type of plastic etc it is.

I also asked that they provide recycling bins for all types of packaging and allowed customers to bring in their own containers for taking products home from the deli,butchery and fish counter, or provide readily recyclable ones as a choice.

I will wait with baited breath for a response but you never know.