The United Kingdom produces millions of tonnes of household waste every year and the majority is land filled rather than recycled or composted. 
 
There are lots of reasons to reduce and recycle your waste, here are some

Save resources 

• Most of what we throw away is made from products that are slowly running out or cannot be replaced quickly enough because of the amount we consume. 
• Many of the materials we throw in landfill tips have a value and can be used again. 
• Many gardeners use peat as a soil improver. This contributes to the destruction of peat bogs, which are non-renewable habitats for wild flowers and animals. Gardeners can make compost from their kitchen and garden waste to use as a soil improver. 

Save energy

• Making new goods out of recycled material saves energy. For example, making new aluminium cans from recycled cans uses 20 times less energy than making cans from the raw material.

Protect the environment

• Reducing what we use and recycling materials reduces the need to dig up or mine new raw materials, which often damages the surrounding environment. 
  

Help charities 

• Many charities and community groups raise money through reusing and recycling. Look around your local high street for charity shops to take your unwanted clothes to or be aware of local groups asking for "jumble". 

Did you know – that plastic bottles are made from oil - a fossil fuel that will one day run out. It is important to make use of materials like plastics that can be recycled and re-used, rather than continually exploiting the fossil fuels used to make them in the first place. 

In Britain we throw away about 455,000 tonnes of plastic bottles every year - that's around 9.1 billion bottles! Many of these end up in landfill where, because plastic bottles are very light but very bulky, they take up lots of space. 

Plastic bottle recycling helps to stop all these bottles being dumped into landfill sites and means the plastic they are made from can be used to make new products. All sorts of amazing products can be made from recycled plastic bottles, including fleece jackets! It takes just 25 x 2 litre pop bottles to make one adult size fleece jacket. 

Recycling just one plastic bottle saves enough energy to power a 60W lightbulb for six hours!