Check what goes into your bins on your council website

Small acts are all it takes to make a big impact

You are directly helping the recycling process that is creating Victoria’s circular economy just by checking your council website to make sure you put the right thing in the right bin. This means that:

• valuable resources can be recovered and turned into new things like park benches, composts, glass jars and egg cartons
• less ends up in landfill
• environmental impacts are lessened by not using new or raw materials.

It’s a small act with a big impact on Victoria’s sustainable future.

Why it matters

Services are changing

Victoria’s recycling systems are changing for the better with the transition to a new household waste and recycling system that will be consistent across the state by 2030. This means the bins you have at home, what goes into them and the recycling services available in your local area could be changing soon. Some councils have already introduced separate services for food and garden organics or glass.

Services differ between councils

Until the transition to the consistent statewide system is complete, recycling services differ from council to council. This includes which waste and recycling services are available to you and what you should put into each bin. These services are designed to maximise the recovery of resources and reduce the amount of waste ending up in landfill.

Things can change

Packaging materials as well as recycling capacity can change over time. Some things that were once destined for landfill are now recyclable and sometimes what we guess is recyclable by the way it looks cannot be recycled.

Sorting correctly helps the process

The contents of each of your bins is collected separately and go to a different place for sorting and processing. Depending on which services are available in your local area:

• Mixed Recycling will go to a materials recovery facility for separation and sorting into different material types like plastic, cardboard and metal, which will be processed and used to make new products.
• Food and garden organics will go to an organics processing centre where it will be processed into compost and soil enhancers which can then be turned into compost and mulch.
• Glass will go to a glass recycling facility where it will be cleaned, sorted by colour and prepared for processing so it can be used to make new glass bottles and even roads.
• General rubbish will be sent to landfill.

We can recover more materials to turn them into new things when you put the right thing in the right bin. Some things can’t be recycled and go to landfill so they don’t contaminate other recycling.

Contaminants are items placed in the wrong bin. Contamination can damage sorting and processing equipment and risk worker safety. In some cases, recyclable or compostable materials end up going to landfill if there are too many contaminants in the load. In fact, 76,000 tonnes of contaminated recycling was sent to landfill in 2019 and 2020 (VLGAS 2021).

You can minimise contamination simply by checking with your council to find out what can and can’t go into your bins.