Recycle

Recycling is the circle of events that turns waste materials into new materials that can be used to make new products.

Recycling should always be the last option for waste. It would be better to reduce the amount of waste we make in the first place, and/or reuse what we can, before we try to recycle anything. This is because recycling uses up a lot of energy, both in transporting the materials to recycling banks or factories and the actual process of recycling itself e.g. sorting, crushing and reshaping.

Did you know...

	Newspapers and magazines can be recycled into paper for stationery or wrapping paper. The material that makes a piece of paper, can be recycled up to seven times?
	Glass can be recycled over and over again, so it is great to take your bottles to bottle banks instead of throwing them away.
	Tin cans can also be recycled over and over again so it is very important to save these from the landfill site.
	Plastic is not easy to recycle, but it is still better to recycle plastic than to throw it away. Click here to find out how plastic can be recycled.

When thinking about recycling it is important to complete the circle by buying recycled products, look on the products label to see if it is made from recycled materials.

Composting is a natural way of recycling food leftovers and garden cuttings. Worms feed on vegetable peelings, teabags and garden cuttings and turn this into compost. You can use this compost to put on your garden to help grow. This reduces the amount of waste going to landfill sites.

	1.) Some plastic can be broken down and recycled to make garden furniture such as picnic benches.
	2.) Some of the plastic that is recycled in Canterbury goes to make plastic piping.
	3.) Certain plastic drink bottles can be used to make clothing such as fleeces.
	4) Shampoo and bubble bath bottles can be recycled into traffic cones!
	5.) Plastic that cannot be recycled into another useful product can be made into fuel pellets and used to make energy in power stations.

All of these uses are good as they stop plastic going to fill up landfill sites. Plastic takes thousands of years to break down so it is a very bad material to fill up landfill sites with.

back