Recycling, Irish style: how is it sorted out?

Rebelheart

I'm still baffled at what passes for recycling in Ireland. I'm just after putting out the rubbish and I put plastic bottles, cardboard boxes, tin cans and paper into the main recycling container. This is following the instructions. As per the instructions, the only recycling that was not placed in it were glass bottles and glass jars.

When I lived in Scandinavia we had to separate all the recycling ourselves. We could even go to the local store and put each can into a machine (similar to a Coke machine), it crushed it, and gave 10 krona back for each can.

Does anybody know how they separate all the recycling material in Ireland? If it's done manually it seems a bizarre (and enormous) waste of time and money given that other European societies get their citizens to have the basic respect for the environment to do it themselves.

If it's done by machine, I'm lost as to what sort of machine could separate everything correctly. Anybody know?

galwayrush

Some is exported afaik, some manual separation i guess, rest probably ends up as landfill ,

leitrim lad

long reach rubber ducks called fuchs, they come in blue and green that i know of and are about 20 tons in weight, and resemble a digger, with a grab on the end of the arm instead of a bucket,

Rebelheart

galwayrush wrote: »

Some is exported afaik, some manual separation i guess, rest probably ends up as landfill ,

Thanks, Galway. I assumed we needed all the recycled material - given that we used the original amount - so I had not thought of exportation. I'd understand the economics of everything being shipped directly abroad and let some low wage economy pay to separate it. But then it seems we are paying to import material back in that has been recycled elsewhere. This, with my limited knowledge, would seem to be a waste (I could have separated everything into the five categories myself, for instance, and we could recycle everything here.)

Rebelheart

leitrim lad wrote: »

long reach rubber ducks called fuchs, they come in blue and green that i know of and are about 20 tons in weight, and resemble a digger, with a grab on the end of the arm instead of a bucket,

Leitrim, that is not very helpful at all! Unless you are saying that some guy has to separate each individual piece of recycling produced by every home and business in Ireland with a machine - which is really hard to believe in efficiency terms.

My name is URL

Whenever I go to the bottle-bank there does be mattresses and fridges dumped in front of it

Irish people fail at waste disposal... The average household has 35 tonnes of garbage in their attic

Mr Benevolent

My name is URL wrote: »

Whenever I go to the bottle-bank there does be mattresses and fridges dumped in front of it

Irish people fail at waste disposal... The average household has 35 tonnes of garbage in their attic

35 tonnes of garbage? That's impossible, the floor of the attic would collapse in a few seconds. Besides, who stores their rubbish in an attic? I normally put mine in the wheeliebin.

Rebelheart

My name is URL wrote: »

Whenever I go to the bottle-bank there does be mattresses and fridges dumped in front of it

Irish people fail at waste disposal

I couldn't agree more. In Christmas 2007 the local recycling here in Meath was overflowing. I went down to Fingal and it was worse, much worse. I left my stuff in the boot, brought it home and let it sit there until after Christmas.

The unemptied bins were entirely the fault of both councils who had clearly not employed the necessary staff over the Christmas period. However, it is entirely the fault of Irish people - and an awful number of them - who don't give a damn and just dump their waste at the recycling bins.

It is long overdue that the recycling centres had working CCTVs to prosecute these people. This would end this practice fairly promptly.

ScumLord

I'm absolutely sure that there must be a machine capable of separating metal from plastics and paper.

In Spain they don't really recycle in allot of places.

Recycling is much more important in such a small place like Ireland though.

My name is URL

Confab wrote: »

35 tonnes of garbage? That's impossible, the floor of the attic would collapse in a few seconds. Besides, who stores their rubbish in an attic? I normally put mine in the wheeliebin.

Can you honestly say that there's no garbage in your attic?

It's a traditional thing.. my granda used to hoard everything he got,
pieces of string..rubber tubes.. tuna tins..

He was a pure bog savage though... with all them tins :pac:

Chris_533976

Watch How its Made or How Do They Do It.

Apparently quite a lot of the stuff we recycle ends up at the landfill because the recycling companies are over capacity.

Rebelheart

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Apparently quite a lot of the stuff we recycle ends up at the landfill because the recycling companies are over capacity.

You have got to be kidding me.

ejmaztec

This re-cycling business can't be cost-effective, mainly thanks to people who haven't quite grasped the concept of flattening cans and plastic bottles before they put them into the bins in their local re-cycling centre.

The brain capacity of these people must be minimal.:eek:

Splendour

AFAIK, it's shipped to China (unsorted) and burnt in an incinerator...

ScumLord

ejmaztec wrote: »

This re-cycling business can't be cost-effective, mainly thanks to people who haven't quite grasped the concept of flattening cans and plastic bottles before they put them into the bins in their local re-cycling centre.

The brain capacity of these people must be minimal.:eek:

Why? All people are told is to put their cans into the big box, nobody said anything about crushing them. Why would anyone assume the cans need to be crushed before going into the bin? especially when there going to be shredded anyway.

Hauk

I've always wondered where all that brown bin stuff goes.

There must be so much of it, and they say they use it for parklands and stuff, but, there must be TONS of it.

Pickled Tranee

recycling in Ireland requires a large field in the middle of nowhere and all the knackers from fasarow go down and dump black bags of **** all over the place. there problem solved

Jeanious

Chris_533976 wrote: »

Apparently quite a lot of the stuff we recycle ends up at the landfill because the recycling companies are over capacity.

Rebelheart wrote: »

You have got to be kidding me.

Quite true, unfortunately. I used to work in a recycling company which collected the recyclable waste for a City Council in the UK, and out of about 10 trucks that we sent out every day, usually at least one of them would have to just dump its entire contents.

What happened was the lads would fill up in the morning, head to the recycling centre at around 12 or so and be weighed. If the weight was over a certain amount (varied, depending on the type of truck), the recycling crowd wouldnt accept it, because it would apparently be "too compacted" and too difficult to separate!

That was completely notwithstanding the weight of the people in the truck (usually 3), and the fact that the drivers had no way of knowing how much they were carrying, so the trick was the get the two loaders to jump out around the corner, i sh1t you not!

Hauk wrote: »

I've always wondered where all that brown bin stuff goes.

There must be so much of it, and they say they use it for parklands and stuff, but, there must be TONS of it.

Well they used to have a big pile of sludge in St. Anne's Park in Raheny, youd go along and dump all that garden waste, they used to shred it and if ya wanted ya could buy a big sack of the shredded version for a pound or somethin. I presume there's some such similar operation somewhere now?

leitrim lad

Rebelheart wrote: »

Leitrim, that is not very helpful at all! Unless you are saying that some guy has to separate each individual piece of recycling produced by every home and business in Ireland with a machine - which is really hard to believe in efficiency terms.

ya sorry ,i should havewent in to more detail, as im in this trade my self, with one of my companies, there are hundreds of recycling plants across the country, probably more than one per county, and rubbish is sorted with similar type machines as i quoted to you, then it is either sent to one of the many power stations nation wide3 like edenderry, or lanesboro, to be insinerated to generate electricity, or anothe company in co monaghan ,moulds plastic kerbs for the side of roads, which would you beleive are actually better than concrete kerbs,

and the rest of it is divided between landfill sites and export, mainly to germany, but recycling is not as efficent as you would ecpect, take for instance 10 tin cans, well when reprocessed they will only turn out about 3 new tin cans, as a result of the recycling process

hope thats enough info for now i might be back later with more if you want

thanks leitrim lad

ejmaztec

ScumLord wrote: »

Why? All people are told is to put their cans into the big box, nobody said anything about crushing them. Why would anyone assume the cans need to be crushed before going into the bin? especially when there going to be shredded anyway.

They should have released an instructional public information dvd on the use of logic, and the number of trips a re-cycling truck has to make each time the bins are "full".:P

3qsmavrod5twfe

ScumLord wrote: »

I'm absolutely sure that there must be a machine capable of separating metal from plastics and paper.

Would it be called a magnet?

Flying Abruptly

Courtney Whispering Reactor wrote: »

Would it be called a magnet?

A magnet wouldnt work for aluminium or tin cans, only iron cobalt and nickel