Rubbish/recycling

I'd be interested to know how much rubbish people generate - only because I'm curious as to whether we generate more or less than average and whether I should try to reduce our waste - definitely not wanting to get into an environmental debate or cast aspersions on people (like me!) who don't do absolutely everything they could to be environmentally friendly. And it's not a competition either!!

We put out two council rubbish bags per week. This does not include glass (which the council collects separately once a fortnight) and the general recycling (paper/cardboard/plastic). So our general rubbish is mostly food scraps, nappies/tissues etc and things that get tossed in when DH or I are too lazy to go to the recycling or the recycling is full. We don't compost or do anything else in terms of recycling.

We are a family of two adults, one 2.5 year old and a 7 month old (both kids in disposable nappies). How does this compare with your household waste?

When i had 2 kids in disposables we used to have one whole bag of dirty nappies a week to put out. Thats when i made the switch to cloth. We are a family of 5, 2 adults and the kids are aged from 4 to 8. Our weekly rubbish bag is about half a big black rubbish sack. that doesnt include paper and stuff that goes in the recycle wheelie bin. We have a compost bin as well.

Our house is 2 adults and 22 months old and 3 week old, both in disposables... We fill a Auckland city wheelie bin of rubbish a week, that is the smaller wheelie bin, probably 2 black sacks equivalent...and also fill the larger recycling bin which is collected fortnightly (filled with recycling).

We are a family of 2 adults and 2 kids (4.5yo and 2.5yo). The 2.5yo is still in sposies most of the time but currently toilet training. We put out 1 council rubbish bag a week. Our recycling bin gets collected fortnightly (glass, plastics and paper/cardboard). We compost a lot of our foodwaste. This week however we put out 2 council rubbish bags only because the 2.5yo had a tummy bug so we went through a lot more sposies than normal, and I emptied out the freezer and cupboards of old food so we needed the second bag.

We have one every 3 week or if I gather extra crap from around the section (blown in rubbish or non recyclables) it is every 2 weeks.

We fill to chocker our recycling bin (it's those big bins) and I do burn a bit on our fire when it's going. I compost every day or if I can't compost it, ie chicken bones or potato peelings they go on the fire.

We recycle glass as well.

BUT we don't have any kids in disposables. When the baby was in them I was putting out a bag a week for the first 4 weeks.

We half fill a small wheelie bin each week and our recycling goes out approx once every 4-6 weeks. We are a family of 3, my 2 year old is in cloth and we use one disposable nappy a night. We compost a fair bit and I buy items with as little packaging as possible and do many things from scratch to avoid extra rubbish.

Edited by sem - 20 October 2012 at 9:26am

Mummydee - me too! I think I knew we were generating more rubbish than we should but a little part of me was hoping I would learn we are average. These other ladies have put me to shame, lol (not suggesting that was their intention obviously, I just admire their ability to reduce waste and want to do the same if possible).

We compost - or rather, we dont' compost, DH composts, I just put it in a bucket. And we recycle what we can, and like I said earlier, use cloth. The amount of rubbish we produce still feels like heaps, I'd like to cut back too.

I basically fill a supermarket bag each week with rubbish. I have a little bin in the cupboard and so I'm very mind full of what goes in it. I have another supermarket bag hanging above it for recycling. I would easily fill one of these a DAY!! it's not that we buy lots with packaging but some how we have lots of recyclables!

Everything plastic or paper I look at and think can I recycle or not. Paper that I can't recyle I put in our fire & burn. Ie pizza boxes.