Metal Matters

Metal packaging is 100% recyclable. Not just once: It can be recycled over and over again, into a huge variety of products. Every time it is recycled it saves naturl resources, energy and cuts greenhouse gas emissions. Best of all, it doesn't take a lot of effort on your part to make a big difference.

Evidence from around Shropshire shows that over 75% of residents are joining in with the recycling collections but most people arent making full use of the system. For example we get alot of drinks cans put out for recycling, but much less food tins (which require additional effort in terms of cleansing) and there appears to be limited awareness that people can add things like aerosol cans, metal foil packaging e.g. foil trays from pies and quiches and tin foil as well.

But it's really important that we recycle every last scrap of metal, because all metal is precious. Metal recycling is one the most environmentally beneficial bits of recycling you can do. If you put just two extra metal cans in your recycling box you'll save enough energy to power your TV set for 12 hours!

Just drop your cans, aerosols, tins and foil in the recycling box- not the rubbish bin. It's as easy as that!




Ever wondered what happens to the metal you recycle?




To make collection more efficient for everyone, our metal packaging gets collected mixed with the plastics and so first it has to go to Veolia's Materials Recycling Facility in Wolverhampton to be separated using special magnets. The metal needs further sorting into the steel and aluminium fractions before they can be recycled.

- Steel goes to AGM in South Wales to be melted down in a furnace to make new steel. It goes into a variety of manufacturing processes. It could end up as a steel girder in a building, or a bicycle or a kettle or a washing machine or baked bean tins - the possibilities are endless!

- Aluminium goes to the Novelis closed-loop recycling plant in Cheshire where it is primarily used to make more cans.

All metal is recyclable

...but unfortunately we cannot currently collect it all from the kerbside…

Please dont put metal items like pots and pans, empty paint tins, bikes, garden tools, door handles, nuts and bolts etc. out for collection! You can still recycle them all but you just need to take them up to "the tip" and put them in the scrap metal bay at the Household Recycling Centre. http://www.shropshire.gov.uk/waste.nsf/open/1536bb96cc150f2580257021004523da