As part of our Green Norwood project, Forum Committee member, Jane East, recently joined a residents’ tour of Smugglers Way waste transfer station. A vast and fascinating place, it receives all of the rubbish from four boroughs, including Lambeth, and 0% ends up in landfill. Recycling is an exciting business. For the good, the bad and the ugly, read on…

None of our waste ends up in landfill.
At the vast and fascinating waste transfer station that is Smugglers Way, the rubbish from four boroughs, including Lambeth, is processed.

Everything in our black bins travels four hours down river to an incineration plant, where heat creates steam that turns a turbine that generates power for 100,000 homes.

Everything in our recycling bins gets tipped into a huge warehouse where a massive claw drops it into bins to send it along a vast network of conveyor belts. (Receiving the rubbish from 500 trucks a day, everything here is on a big scale.)

The good:
· In 2000, across the UK, we recycled about 3% of waste. Today we recycle about 30%.
· Aluminium and steel cans and glass are infinitely recyclable. They never degrade. A bale of 40,000 crushed aluminium cans can sell for upwards of £1300.

The bad:
· The council pays £174 per metric tonne to dispose of the rubbish in our black bins and just £32 per metric tonne for our recycling. At a time when council funding is under so much pressure, this could make a big difference.
· Soft plastics contaminate everything. Plastic bags hang from the conveyor belts and ceilings like cobwebs or creepers. They cannot yet be recycled in our bins at home.
· Batteries, vapes and aerosols are a nightmare fire hazard and cannot go in your green bins.

The ugly:
· There is a team of about 30 pickers whose job it is to pull out (at pace) all of the stuff on the conveyor belts that cannot be recycled. And there is an awful lot of it. Hard plastics like toys, soft plastics like bags, textiles, pillows, random bits of wood or household items.

‘Simpler recycling’ is coming (watch this space) but until it does, here is an A-Z of what to do with your waste in Lambeth.
And here is a list of all the  Reuse and Recycling Centres in Lambeth
Let’s be good and proud recyclers.