"All this festive consumption means extra waste, which if consigned to the bin will end up in landfill and potentially generate methane, a potent greenhouse gas"
Dr Liz Goodwin, Chief Executive of WRAP
Banbury, Oxon, England: English households are expected to produce nearly three quarters of a million tonnes (736,574) of extra waste this Christmas according to new research.
The research undertaken by Recycle Now, estimates that families will throw out an additional five sacks of refuse over Christmas and the New Year.
WRAP says that this equates to 1.4 million tonnes of CO2, which is equivalent to providing enough energy from the waste to run over 177,000 Play Station 3’s for a year or enable half the households in a City like Leeds to watch TV for a year.
Looking at it a different way, each family in the UK creates at least 68kg of CO2 from this extra waste which is equivalent to providing enough energy to power home fairy-lights continuously for 18 years, according to WRAP.
Dr Liz Goodwin, Chief Executive of WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme), which delivers the Recycle Now campaign on behalf of the Government, said:
“All this festive consumption means extra waste, which if consigned to the bin will end up in landfill and potentially generate methane, a potent greenhouse gas. One way in which we can all make a difference this Christmas is by recycling and the good news is that nine out of ten homes now have a doorstep recycling service for a range of materials including paper, card, glass, metal cans.
“Recycling also has a positive impact on helping to tackle climate change, with current recycling in the UK saving greenhouse gases equivalent to taking 5 million cars off the road.”
What can be recycled at Xmas?
Throughout the year as well as Christmas, glass bottles and jars, newspapers, magazines, cardboard packaging and metal drink and food cans, can be recycled through existing kerbside collection schemes and local recycling points. In addition many local authorities and garden centres will also be recycling Christmas trees after the festive period.
Recycle Now has also teamed up with the Woodland Trust Christmas Card Recycling Scheme to enable people to recycle their cards throughout January at participating Tesco (excludes Express), mainland WHSmith high street stores (except Worcester), TKMaxx or Marks & Spencer stores throughout January.
Further information
For more information on recycling or to find out details about your local recycling services, visit www.recyclenow.com.
Recycle Now
Launched by Matthew Pinsent in September 2004, Recycle Now is the multi-media national recycling campaign, implemented and managed by WRAP (the Waste & Resources Action Programme) on behalf of the Government. The aim of the campaign is to encourage more people to recycle more stuff, more often.
WRAP
Works in partnership to encourage and enable businesses and consumers to be more efficient in their use of materials and recycle more things more often. This helps to minimise landfill, reduce carbon emissions and improve our environment.
Established as a not-for-profit company in 2000, WRAP is backed by substantial Government funding from Defra and the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
More information on all of WRAP’s programmes can be found at www.wrap.org.uk and for more information on the Recycle Now campaign visit www.recyclenow.com .