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❑ Household appliances and electronics - In today ’ s increasingly throw-away economy it is impossible to repair small appliances when they break , and in today ’ s convenience-driven world many more small appliances have motors and batteries within them . Think electric razors , hairdryers , blenders , massagers etc . While the outers of such devices may be made of plastic , inside there is metal , and often metal of high value , which can be recycled . The same goes for old computers , screens and the inevitable accumulation of spare cables and leads one acquires every time one buys a new device . Specialist recyclers of electronics will take such items off you hands with relish . ❑ Batteries – Leadacid batteries , such as car batteries
are , of course , recycled by law ( you can ' t buy a battery without either paying extra or swopping it for a spent unit ). But all batteries , even the small ones found in watches and cellphones should be recycled because they contain significant amounts of harmless chemicals and metals . ❑ Kitchen waste – Mostof your family ' s waste will be generated in the kitchen , and while much of it can be recycled , it is also here that the largest proportion of your landfill material will originate . Food waste such as vegetable peelings and uneaten food scraps can be composted , which bones and meat scraps can be disposed of in a bokashi bucket . Used cooking oil should not becompostedasitwill prevent air from reaching other compostable material , leading to putrefaction . But here are two uses to which cooking oil can be put . Firstly cooking oil is the feedstock for a large proportion of the biofuel made today , and if you generate large amounts , for example from a fast food outlet or restaurant , biofuel manufacturers will collect your oil for reprocessing . Smaller volumes of cooking oil , when combined with equal volumes of diesel , make an excellent form oil for concrete castings . With much of your kitchen waste being recycled , just about the only stuff that should be consigned to a landfill is wet kitchen waste , in the form of used cooking and freezer bags , used clingwrap and the little polystyrene trays in which supermarkets sell their meat . ❑ Medicines – Many people flush expired or superfluous medicines down the drain . This should be discouraged ,
ENVIRONMENT especially if your grey water is reused in your home or garden because although the quantities are small , many medicines contain complex chemicals which don ' t break down easily and which , over time , will build up as a soil contaminant . Rather , expired medicines should be returned to your pharmacy for safe disposal . All the classes of recyclable material described have a monetary value when taken to a depot . However , for many the time and hassle involved makes it not worth
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