Recycling and Sustainability

Our recycling and sustainability approach is built around one simple idea: keeping valuable materials in use for as long as possible. In busy urban areas, where homes, flats, and businesses generate a wide mix of waste every day, effective recycling services can make a real difference. By improving segregation at source, increasing collection efficiency, and supporting local reuse, we help reduce landfill pressure and lower emissions across the communities we serve.

Recycling percentage target: we are working toward a minimum 65% recycling rate across suitable waste streams, with year-on-year improvements in material recovery. This target is supported by careful sorting, dedicated routes for recyclable loads, and better handling of cardboard, metals, plastics, and wood. We also promote simple separation habits in boroughs where mixed waste can still limit recycling performance, encouraging residents and businesses to keep dry recyclables cleaner and easier to process.

Our recycling services are designed to support local priorities and align with borough-level approaches to waste separation. In many areas, that means keeping food waste apart from dry mixed recycling, setting aside garden waste where available, and making sure bulky items are assessed for reuse before disposal. We focus on practical recovery methods that reflect the realities of city living: limited storage space, higher-density housing, and the need for fast, reliable collections that keep communal areas clear.

Local transfer stations play an important role in the journey from collection to reuse or recycling. These facilities act as efficient hubs where waste can be sorted, consolidated, and directed to the most appropriate processing route. By using nearby transfer stations, we reduce unnecessary travel distance and improve the flow of recyclable materials. This helps support a lower-carbon operation while ensuring that items such as metal fixtures, paper, and segregated construction waste can be separated more effectively before final treatment.

Partnerships with charities are central to our sustainability work. Whenever suitable items are collected, we look first at whether they can be repaired, refurbished, or donated. Furniture, reusable household goods, office equipment, and textiles may be redirected through trusted charity partners, helping extend product lifespans and support local communities. This reuse-first approach reduces waste and makes recycling more meaningful by keeping still-useful items out of the disposal stream.

We also work with a broad mix of recycling activity relevant to urban boroughs, including the recovery of paper and card from offices, the sorting of cans and tins from hospitality sites, and the careful management of plastics from residential clear-outs. Where boroughs operate different waste separation rules, we adapt our methods to ensure materials are handled responsibly and routed correctly. That flexibility matters, because cleaner, better-sorted loads improve recycling outcomes and reduce contamination.

To further cut emissions, our collection fleet includes low-carbon vans designed to reduce fuel use and environmental impact. These vehicles support more efficient routes, quieter collections, and lower tailpipe emissions than older fleets. Combined with smarter scheduling, they help us reduce the carbon footprint associated with recycling and waste movements, especially across dense neighbourhoods with frequent stops and short journey patterns.

Recycling and sustainability also depend on day-to-day operational choices. We prioritise compacting recyclable loads where appropriate, reducing empty return journeys, and coordinating collections so that vehicles spend less time on the road. In practice, that means more material recovered with fewer emissions per tonne handled. It also supports a circular economy mindset, where waste is seen not as an end point but as a source of future materials and value.

In areas with mixed housing and commercial activity, we recognise that sustainable recycling must be adaptable. Some boroughs place particular emphasis on separating paper, glass, and metals at the source, while others focus on food waste diversion or local reuse networks. By working within these local systems and encouraging good separation habits, we help make recycling simpler, cleaner, and more effective. That can improve recovery rates and reduce the amount of recyclable material lost to landfill or incineration.

Sustainability is not only about collecting recyclable material; it is also about designing services that support long-term environmental goals. We aim to reduce contamination, increase reuse, and keep useful materials in circulation for longer. From sorting mixed recyclables to diverting reusable goods to charity partners, every step is intended to improve the environmental performance of the service and make better use of resources already in the community.

We also encourage better separation of waste streams where local systems allow it. That may include keeping soft plastics apart from rigid plastics, separating cardboard from general dry waste, and ensuring hazardous items are isolated from standard recycling. These small actions help support higher-quality recycling results and make it easier to process materials responsibly at transfer stations and onward facilities.

Looking ahead, our focus remains on practical improvements that deliver measurable gains: higher recycling percentages, more material reused through charity partnerships, and fewer emissions from transport. By combining low-carbon vans, local transfer stations, and borough-aware recycling practices, we are building a service that supports both residents and the wider environment. The aim is straightforward: make recycling more efficient, more local, and more sustainable for the long term.