Recycling - where does it go?

We're all very good at putting things out for recycling in our black boxes and blue bins and green bins, or taking items to the Household Recycling Centres. But what happens to our ejecta when the collectors have taken them away?

Hills Waste in their annual review have published a map - go to Wiltshire municipal waste contract - Annual service review 2012/13 and download the pdf.

Here's a summary:

Glass goes to Yorkshire to be turned back into bottles and jars.

Cardboard goes to Kent to make new cardboard.

Paper goes to Aylesford, also in Kent, to make newsprint.

Textiles and clothes make the shorter journey to Devizes. The good stuff is sent to developing countries, the rest gets shredded for cleaning cloths.

Cans go to Warrington to make steel and aluminium products.

Plastic bottles go first to Loughborough to be sorted, then get exported to the Far East for reprocessing.

Garden waste is composted at Purton.

Of the material you currently have to take to the HRCs:

Scrap metal goes to local dealers.

Household batteries go to Matlock.

Cooking oil goes to Nottingham to make biofuel.

Fridges and Freezers travel to Newport.

Other electrical appliances go to Newbury to be dismantled.

Household chemicals are recycled at Avonmouth.

Rigid plastics get granulated at Westbury.

The lead in car batteries is recycled at Glastonbury.

Tyres go to Westbury to be converted into equestrian surfaces.

Wood goes to Germany to make electricity.

Plasterboard goes to Grantham to make gypsum products.

Cartons go to Sweden.

... and the residual household waste is landfilled at Calne or incinerated at Slough or converted to fuel at Westbury.