Christmas is a time of celebration but more spending, eating and drinking means we create more waste.
We produce around 3 million extra tonnes of waste over the festive period - each person in England will throw away an average of 50 kilos of rubbish over Christmas. But by a bit of thinking and planning ahead, and by making full use of your recycling services you can help send less to landfill and save yourself money too.
Here are some ideas to help you recycle more and save money at Christmas:
Christmas gifts
How to recycle more at Christmas
Love Food Hate Waste Christmas tips
Christmas tree recycling and recycling and refuse collection dates
Christmas gifts
This year each person will spend an average of £425 on Christmas presents, of which £92 will be spent on unwanted gifts! By choosing your presents carefully, you can help to reduce the amount of waste we produce and help find the perfect present that will never get thrown away!
- Choose an event instead, such as a trip to the theatre or cinema, a meal out or a weekend away.
- Choose vouchers or subscriptions to magazines or membership organisations instead.
- Choose presents made from recycled materials. There are a wide range of novel and exciting presents made from recycled material. The Recycle Now website has a whole range of recycled gift ideas.
- Instead of buying cards, put the money you've saved towards a charity such as Send A Cow to help African farmers or send an electronic card. The Recycle Now website has a card with a recycling message you may like to send.
- Not sure what to buy for the relative who has everything? Help others who are not so lucky - there are plenty of ideas at www.oxfamunwrapped.com
- If you do receive unwanted gifts why not donate them to charity? The British Heart Foundation will even take unwanted, working electricals in some of their shops - check on their website www.bhf.org
- Make sure you buy wrapping paper that can easily be recycled (avoid shiny foil type paper), or even better buy recycled wrapping paper.
- Avoid overpackaged goods and try to buy good in packaging that can easily be recycled.
How to recycle more at Christmas
- Remember you can use your weekly green box service to recycle all of the following Christmas packaging in addition to all the other materials we collect:
| White backed wrapping paper, greetings cards, TV magazines and newspapers, Christmas catalogues and directories and envelopes. |
Glass bottles and jars |
| Food and drinks cans |
Aluminium foil |
| Household plastic packaging (bottles, tubs, pots and trays) |
Batteries |
- Use your blue bag to recycle your cardboard and brown paper. Please cut cardboard up or fold it to fit into your blue bag so it will fit on our collection vehicle.
- Make the most of your weekly food waste collection this Christmas - you can recycle all your food waste including plate scrapings. Any uncooked fruit and vegetable scraps can go into your compost bin along with natural Christmas trimmings such as holly and mistletoe.
Love Food Hate Waste Christmas tips
Did you know that every month in the UK households throw away £50 worth of food that could have been eaten? By making a shopping list, checking the cupboards and fridge and eating up leftovers for lunch, we could all enjoy an extra bit of cash in the run up to Christmas and reduce the amount of good food being thrown away. Here are some ideas:
- Your Christmas food shop doesn’t need to be stressful – planning meals in advance, checking what foods we already have in the house and knowing what we’re going to buy before we go will make the trip a lot easier and quicker.
Turkey doesn’t have to be just for Christmas. Carve it all up on Christmas day and freeze any leftovers to use for pies, stir fry, curry or stroganoff. Or try turkey as a substitute for other meat – why not try turkey bolognaise, chilli con turkey, lasagne or cottage pie? There are lots of recipe ideas on lovefoodhatewaste.com
If you’re catering for extra people why not try the Perfect Portion calculator lovefoodhatewaste.com/perfect_portions to remove the guess work? If you do find yourself with extras, freeze the leftovers as home made ready meals for the new year.
As many of us don’t want to even think about going to the shops over the Christmas period, store some milk in the freezer. Even the smallest amount of milk can be frozen, quickly defrosting on the worktop for a quick cup of tea. And toast bread from frozen to save time.
Put a mixture of bread rolls, muffins and cakes in the freezer, they will defrost in no time and are a hassle free treat for unexpected visitors.
The most important date to remember at Christmas is the use by date – you can eat or freeze foods right up the end of the use by date. Best before dates are for quality you can eat foods after this date but they may no longer be at their best.
Use up any leftover smoked salmon, eggs and cream by making a quiche to eat or freeze. Or cook it all up with scrambled eggs for a special breakfast treat on toast.
Left over hard cheeses, such as stilton and cheddar, are perfect for freezing. Even the smallest portions can be frozen and are perfect for dropping straight into soups and sauces for extra flavour.
Christmas tree recycling and recycling and refuse collection dates
For details of the revised recycling and refuse collection dates for Christmas and New Year 2011/12 see here Bank Holiday - Revised Recycling and Refuse Collections
Throughout January 2012, we will collect your real Christmas tree for free for composting. Please:
- Remove all decorations including the pot
- Cut it up if over 4ft tall
- Put it out on your garden waste collection day next to your waste and recycling so our crews can easily see it.