Praise for residents' recycling efforts

Hull residents are recycling more household waste than ever before, meaning less waste is heading to the landfill site.

In June, general waste collected by Hull City Council was reduced by 1,165 tonnes compared to the same month last year – a 15 per cent reduction.
That amounts to almost 150 double-decker buses.
The reduction is because residents have become more willing to recycle using their black boxes and blue bins.
The increase in recycling is also being attributed to the council issuing 100,000 free re-usable green waste bags this year.
They are an ideal way of transporting green waste such as grass and hedge clippings to the household waste recycling centres at Burma Drive, Wilmington Road and Wiltshire Road.
And more than 10,000 free home compost bins have also been distributed to residents.
"We can't rely for much longer on disposing of our waste in landfill sites because it harms the environment through creating greenhouse gases such as methane which cause climate change," says Cllr Dave Woods, who is responsible for waste management in the city.
"It's great to see residents taking more responsibility for the environment, but we are still recycling less than a quarter of all our household waste. We still need to double our efforts to reach the target set by the Government by 2010 – otherwise the council could be fined and then may have to cut back vital services."
April, May and August, saw the amount of waste disposed of reduced by hundreds of tonnes each month, but the floods saw the amount of domestic waste rise by 1,716 tonnes in July.
"People had other things on their minds than recycling and many bulky items had to be thrown out," adds Cllr Woods.
"We now need to get back into the habit of recycling as much as possible."
The city's recycling rate is currently 24.6 per cent.
The target set by the government is 45 per cent by 2010.
To claim your free green waste bag (offer limited to one per household) visit one of the recycling centres. There are only 7,500 remaining.
To order a compost bin visit www.recyclenow.com/compost or call 0845 077 0757.