Soap star Chrismas tips

“We all end up with mountains of paper, cardboard and plastic packaging from our presents and the entertaining at Christmas.  The good news is that the majority of us now have the benefit of a local council kerbside collection scheme so it’s easy to recycle most of our rubbish.  Just log onto www.recyclenow.com and enter your postcode to see what you can put in your kerbside collection, or to find out details of your local recycling centre.”

“I’ll be buying rechargeable batteries for all the children’s new toys and electrical gadgets that are sure to be unwrapped this Christmas.  They are much more economical, only costing 1p to charge, and, more importantly, for every 500 charges I make, I’ll be saving 499 batteries being thrown away and going to landfill! Some councils can recycle old batteries - visit www.recyclenow.com to see if yours does, or if you need to take them to a local recycling centre. ” 

“Downloading and offloading CDs will be what many people receiving new iPods this Christmas will be doing – so this is a reminder for them, and for those just sorting out their collections. Although your local recycling centre or kerbside scheme won't accept CDs for recycling, there are other organisations that will recycle them for you.  Log onto www.recyclenow.com for further details.” 

“As well as providing recycling facilities for glass, cans, paper and cardboard, supermarkets are a great place to get rid of old boots and shoes. Recycling old boots and shoes is also a brilliant way to help third world countries, but please don’t forget to fasten them together in pairs! Log onto www.recyclenow.com to find your nearest facility.” 

“Children soon grow out of toys, so make room for the new ones they’ll be getting this Christmas by taking their old ones to a local children’s centre or charity shop where they can find a good home” 

“We’ll get through a whopping three million tonnes of waste this Christmas – enough to fill 400,000 double decker buses7.  It’s so easy to recycle now using your local kerbside recycling service and it’s a really effective way to help climate change.  Through recycling, a household typically saves about 175kg of CO2 each year.  Visit www.recyclenow.com and enter your postcode details to find out what you can recycle near you. 

“Why not make it your New Year resolution to start your own compost bin?  It’s a great place to put all your vegetable peelings from Christmas dinner, plus all those extra newspapers and cardboard.  And by Spring you’ll have great compost for your garden.”