How are we doing? Recycling figures

Recycling Targets

You are recycling more than ever. A study across the Shropshire Waste Partnership (which includes North Shropshire) found that Shropshire residents are recycling record levels of household waste and are exceeding Government recycling targets.

In the year April 2005 to March 2006, almost 35% of the household waste produced in the Shropshire County Council area was recycled or composted - a performance increase of 20% on the previous year, and well above the Government's recycling target of 21%. This year, with a full year of kerbside recycling collections, you will be doing better again.

The figures recorded by the partner councils for the amount of household waste recycled or composted in 2005/2006 were:

Council	2005/2006	2004/2005
Oswestry Borough Council	42.06%	28.81%
North Shropshire District Council	38.49%	28.77%
South Shropshire District Council	37.22%	30.76%
Bridgnorth District Council	35.43%	30.76%
Shropshire County Council	34.8%	28.66%

Household Recycling Centre recycling performance

Site	2005/2006	2004/2005
Battlefield Enterprise Park / Betton Abbots, Shrewsbury	43%	38%
Waymills Civic Park, Whitchurch / Heathgates, Prees	42%	44%
Long Lane Industrial Park, Craven Arms	42%	39%
Maesbury Road, Oswestry	36%	38%
Barnsley Lane, Bridgnorth	35%	35%
All sites	40%	38%

These figures show how much of the waste taken to each centre is sent for recycling, though they don't include soil and rubble which are excluded from the official performance figures for recycling and composting.

Recycling Centre User Survey

In February 2006 a survey of recycling centre users was carried out, to ask people for their view on the Household Recycling Centres (HRCs).

Visitors to the centres in Shrewsbury, Whitchurch, Oswestry, Craven Arms and Bridgnorth were interviewed by staff from a specialist research company, and asked what they thought about the facilities and service. Visitors to the new centres in Shrewsbury and Whitchurch were also asked how they rated the new facilities compared to the sites that they replaced, at Betton Abbots and Prees respectively.

The results were very positive:

Overall, 98% of those asked were 'very' or 'fairly' satisfied wtih the overall service provided.
62% felt that the service had improved over the past two years
93% were very or fairly satisfied with the helpfulness of staff
94% felt that the new HRCs at Shrewsbury and Whitchurch were better than the old ones.

The full results are available on the Shropshire County Council website.

Doorstepping research

A doorstepping campaign to promote recycling and gather information on resident's attitudes to recycling and what/how much they claimed to recycle was carried out between November 2005 and February 2006. The research was carried out in the Bridgnorth, North Shropshire, Oswestry and South Shropshire districts and found that:

88% of people said they used their dry recycling boxes every two weeks
In Bridgnorth, newspaper was the most common item put into the recycling box (by 96% of of people), followed by glass jars (92%) and cans (92%)
In North Shropshire, glass bottles were the most common item put out (by 91%of people), followed by newspapers (89%) and food and drink cans (80%)
In Oswestry, newspaper was the most common item put out (by 91% of people), followed by cans (85%) and glass bottles (81%)
In South Shropshire, glass bottles were the most common item put into the recycling box (by 96% of people), followed by cans (82%) and newspapers (82%)
The main reason people gave for not using the recycling boxes was that they visited the recycling centre instead
Overall, 25% of people said that they compost at home - just below the national average of 30%

Did you know?

It is estimated that each year up to 420,000 tonnes of waste wood is produced by households
Recycling one tonne of paper saves enough electricity to run an average three bedroom house for one year
Just 25 two-litre bottles can be recycled into a fleece jacket
In 2004/2005, Shropshire residents recycled the equivalent of over 5 million wine bottles or over 10 million jam jars
Recycling one aluminium can saves enough energy to light a 100 watt light bulb for 20 hours
The energy saving from recycling one bottle will power a colour TV for 20 minutes
Black bag waste represents 10% of the waste sent to landfill from the Battlefield centre in Shrewsbury, over 20% of the waste from Whitchurch and Bridgnorth and over 30% for Oswestry