Our recycling strategy for the next 3 years set out how we will work with residents and businesses across the city to manage Cardiff’s waste.
We all need to make changes to achieve the 70% recycling target we must meet as a city by 2025.
Changes to kerbside collections
The main changes for households are:
- Separated recycling collection: recycling will be separated into 3 containers.
- More items will be collected from the kerbside, including small electrical items, Tetra Paks and coffee pods.
We are reviewing Cardiff’s general waste collections to consider different bin sizes, frequency of collection, and their suitability. We will also pilot ways to improve recycling collections at blocks of flats and HMOs (Houses in Multiple Occupation).
Additional changes
Other changes include:
- separate recycling collections for all businesses collected by Cardiff Council’s trade service,
- encourage repair, re-use and waste reduction throughout the city through increased partnership working,
- bringing recycling facilities into the local communities,
- deliver door-to-door recycling education in areas of poor recycling performance,
- same day street clean and stricter enforcement after collections.
Reasons for the changes
- 24 million single use green bags are used each year at the cost of almost £1million. We need to move to re-usable containers.
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30% of the items in green recycling bags go to the Energy from Waste plant as they’re in the wrong bag. We need to improve the quality of our recycling.
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Almost 50% of waste in black bins could be recycled.
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We must meet the 70% recycling target by 2025 and the One Planet Cardiff objectives.
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To improve the street cleanliness throughout Cardiff.
What happens next?
It will take us some time to introduce these changes. You will receive further information before the changes are introduced.
Find information about recycling services in Cardiff.
Public response to our waste strategy consultation
We did a 6 week consultation during Spring 2022. 3,305 people responded.
These are the highlights of the results:
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85% agreed Cardiff needs to improve the quality of material collected.
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48.8% agreed with separating recycling into three containers.
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32% asked for different options for different areas of the city
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19.2% asked to consider full kerbside collection.
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76.9% residents use a recycling centre and 91% say the 28 visits-per-year allowance is enough.
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57.3% asks for more recycling centres in Cardiff, and (51.7%) for more opportunities to donate items to be re-used.
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88.8% are interested in a re-use collection for large household items.
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83.9% agree that the council should reduce its single-use plastic impact and move to re-useable recycling containers.
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72.1% would like to see more re-fill zones throughout Cardiff.
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85% agree the council to move to electric vehicles.
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35.1% feel the council informs residents about how and what to recycle.
Those who responded suggested we need to:
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improve the use of social media and other digital platforms,
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deliver more leaflets and letters to households,
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work with children, including schools and youth clubs, and
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work with communities and volunteers to help deliver messages.
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