Recycling - Logie area

Following queries from Logie residents about the sorting of recycled materials in the green boxes, I queried the matter with the City Council and the Waste and Environment Project Team Leader has updated me as follows:

"The green boxes are no longer sorted at the kerbside but decanted fully mixed into the collection vehicle and taken to our Baldovie Depot. Once at Baldovie, the dry mixed recyclate (DMR) is then bulked & loaded onto containers for onward transportation to our reprocessors Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) where a variety of techniques are used to separate & sort the various materials - magnets for the steel, eddy current separators for plastics & alu cans, optical sort technology for glass etc - ready for recycling. 

This particular collection methodology - known as co-mingled - enables us to use standard collection vehicles rather than the specialist multi-chambered vehicles required for the previous kerbside-sort system, and is much quicker and more efficient - meaning that a greater number of properties can potentially be served on these routes. 

We decided to trial this methodology earlier in the year to assess its potential and following positive feedback from the reprocessor we then began our burgundy bin trial - the co-mingled collection of DMR in a 240-litre bin on a 4-weekly cycle. The DMR from both burgundy bins & green boxes are therefore collected fully co-mingled & sent for sorting. We aim to use the information gathered during this trial to inform future decisions regarding recyclate kerbside collections in Dundee.

A press release was issued at the time of the methodology change & information on the new system is available on the website -  www.dundeecity.gov.uk/environment/kerbsiderecycling."