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Call to keep clothes and shoes dry for recycling.
The Somerset Waste Partnership1 is reminding people to think about the weather before putting out their clothes and shoes in their recycling box2.
Most items can be put out for recycling regardless of the weather, and can still be recycled even if wet. Clothes and shoes are an exemption to this. If they get wet or damp mildew will form and it only takes a few items to ruin an entire load.
Cllr Nigel Woollcombe-Adams, Chair of the Somerset Waste Partnership explained: “Damp clothes and shoes can be a big problem, so we ask people not to put them out if it looks like it is going to rain. Even when it is dry we ask people to pop them in a plastic bag, tie them together if they have laces, and remember that shoes are only any good if in pairs!”
If clothes and shoes put out for recycling are not collected, it is because they have become too wet to be recycled.
Somerset residents recycled 584 tonnes of clothes and shoes through the kerbside recycling collection last year, helping to achieve a recycling rate of over 47 per cent.
ECT Recycling, which collects recycling at the kerbside in Somerset initially send them to a recycling plant near Yeovil for sorting. They then go to developing countries for reuse if they are wearable, or are sent to be recycled into cloths, fibres and filling material if they are not reusable3.
To find out more about recycling, contact your local Council or log on to www.recyclesomerset.info.
ENDS
Notes to Editors:
1. Somerset Waste Partnership
The Somerset Waste Partnership provides waste and recycling services on behalf of Mendip, South Somerset, Sedgemoor and West Somerset District Councils, Taunton Deane Borough Council and Somerset County Council.
Last year Somerset achieved a household waste recycling rate of over 47% (2006/07) compared to a national rate of 30%. In 2006/07 Somerset recycled and composted 129,957 tonnes of household waste and landfilled 144,932 tonnes.
2. Clothes and shoes are accepted in the kerbside recycling service in Mendip, Sedgemoor, South Somerset and Taunton Deane. Residents in West Somerset are encouraged to use their local Household Waste Recycling Centre or mini recycling banks.
3. 4% of household waste in Somerset is textiles (such as clothes and shoes). Textiles are sent to M & J Bowyers, Limington, near Yeovil. At the recycling plant the materials are separated into items that can be reused and items to be recycled. Wearable items are sent off to developing countries to be reused. Cotton and silk make wiping cloths for industry, woollen fibres are reclaimed to make new yarns and fabrics, and shredded clothes are used as filling material for furniture and car seats.
20 February 2008
For further details contact Paul Chiplen
01823 355665
Email: Paul.chiplen@somersetwaste.gov.uk
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