004 - WEEK 4 UPDATE

Presenting the research and project inspiration.

I struggled a lot over summer, and even last year, to find an idea. Every time I thought I had something, I’d not be satisfied by the idea. I'd think it wasn't innovating or exciting enough. I realised that I needed to look closer to home and I had a think about my values in life. Being eco-friendly is an important topic for me and something I actively include in my every day life ; I buy most of my clothes and jewellery second hand. I have a reusable coffee cup and water bottle, and I try to be as efficient as possible with energy at home.

But recently I’ve had more and more questions about recycling. And I’ve realised it’s a topic I understand very little about. I’m someone who need to understand as much as possible, otherwise sometimes I get frustrated.

So, how much do I actually know about recycling? And how much do you know?

Do you know what happens to our waste after if goes out into the recycling facilities? Or where the facilities even are? I have no idea.

I realised that I didn’t know much at all, which conflicts directly with my values on climate action.

I live in a central flat and there are no recycling bins at the flat door, I didn’t know where to recycle my paper, plastic or glass. For a while, I used the recycling bins belonging to the café next door, but one day I was caught by the (surprisingly) very unhappy owner and I was told off. He told me he paid for these bins to be there and to be emptied. “Too many people throw random things in the bins, which means that the whole batch gets contaminated”, he said. Even if I was put the correct things in the bin, he argued that people seeing me do so, could assume that they could just use them as normal, landfill bins.

So, I couldn’t use these bins, what next? Where do I bring my recycling? And if myself, an environmentally active student, couldn’t find a recycling bin near my flat, would any other busy families, older people or just lazy students take the time to not only find out where the recycling bins are, but also bring their paper, plastic and metal there? I thought probably not.

Last month I volunteered for a day at the Dundee Flower and Food Festival, where I stood in front of the recycling bins and advised people where to properly dispose of their rubbish. I spoke to the public about what could and could not be recycled, and in which bins things were recycled in. Lots of interesting questions came up from this.

Let’s talk about all of those cardboard/paper plates that you get at festivals, events or even at our union. You use them and feel slightly better about yourself because you think it can be recycled, right? Well, they can’t. They go straight into landfill. Any paper or cardboard that is even slightly contaminated by food or oils can’t be recycled. So all used pizza boxes go straight to landfill. Or worse, what I did up till now ; I’d put them in the paper recycling bin, and contaminate the whole batch. This meant the whole bin would need to go into landfill. Understandably people were quite shocked.

Another fact that annoyed people, concerned all the wooden knives and forks given out. These aren’t recycled. Why? Dundee doesn’t have the facility to recycle wood.

And that’s where this project comes in. I’d like to research into what happens the unrecycled waste of Dundee.