Greening Melbourne...

What type of plastic is used for bottles ?

PET or polyethylene terephthalate is the most common plastic that is used in soft drink water bottles. This is because of its higher level of strength and can come in different colours. It has been know to be used in some beauty, health and cleaning products.

In most countries, PET plastics are labelled with the number one surrounded by a triangle. This is the universal symbol for PET. It is normally found on the back of the packaging and is measured from 1 to 7 to state the resin used.

One pickup at a time!

Simple things to lower your plastic footprint ?

• Avoid soft plastics where possible as they mostly go to landfill because they are harder to be broken down

• Where reusable items are available, like a food container or coffee mug use these over a single use alternative

• Look for the labels on the back of the product to see what you can and cannot recycle

Unfortunately, less than 20% of plastics used in Australia ends up recycled. The rest ends up in waterways, landfill or the ocean where it takes anywhere from 10 to 500 years to brake down completely.

What the figures look like ?

Recycling contamination occurs when a material or object that cannot be recycled is mixed in with materials that can be. When this happens, sorting is required to remove the unwanted object.

What is contamination in recycling ?

How to know if you can recycle the plastic you have?

What cannot be recycled?

Items such as plastic bags, cling wrap,coffee cups and straws cannot be recycled as they are either made from soft plastics or have an inner lining within them.