New refuse and recycling service begins in Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey next week
The new refuse and recycling collections in Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey begin next Monday, 4th July.
From this date householders will receive a fortnightly refuse collection, alternating with a fortnightly recycling collection from blue recycling bins. Both collections will be on the same day of the week – recycling one week and refuse the next.
Householders should by now have received a guide explaining the new collections and a calendar showing their collections dates. Residents of areas currently receiving blue box recycling collections for paper and tin cans should also have been delivered a new blue recycling bin. The blue wheelie bins take a wider range of materials – paper, cardboard, food tins and drink cans and plastic bottles. Any householder who has not received a bin or calendar and guide should contact the Council on 01349 886603.
People are being encouraged to reuse their redundant blue boxes to store glass bottles and jars before taking them to a Recycling Point. Currently, on average, households in the area are only recycling about half their glass bottles and jars.
The existing brown bin garden waste collection service in urban areas is not affected by the changes. Residents of rural areas are encouraged to compost at home and avoid putting garden waste in their refuse bin. Garden waste can also be taken to Recycling Centres for composting. Organic material, such as garden waste, is particularly harmful when buried in landfill sites as it emits climate changing gases.
The Highland Council’s commercial customers in Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey are also being offered recycling collections for the first time and these are being welcomed by environmentally aware businesses. The new collections also have the potential to offer businesses considerable financial savings as the charges for recycling collections are significantly lower than refuse collections. Although some customers have had to initially invest in additional bins, others have been able to ‘convert’ refuse bins to recycling bins using blue stickers provided by the Council.
The new collections are being extended to the whole of the Highland Council area over the coming year and have already been successfully introduced in Skye and Lochalsh, Lochaber and Caithness.
Councillor John Laing, chairman of the TEC services committee, said that the new collection service showed the way forward and would offer both financial savings and environmental benefits: “Where the new collections have already been introduced there has been a significant increase in recycling and a reduction in landfilled waste. These changes are essential if we are to meet Scottish Government long term targets to recycle 70% of all waste by 2025.”
The Highland Council’s Waste Awareness Team can offer advice on reducing waste and increasing recycling to both householders and businesses and can be contacted on 01349 886603.