Recycle
March 2023 Update - The 3R\'s Guide has now been compiled, reviewed and published. A copy is available by clicking on the link in side bar opposite this article. If you have any feed back you can contact Jane via the bluebird symbol. Please remember this is only a guide and the information was correct at the time of its inception.
The Dorset Council Waste Promotion Officer, who answered numerous questions with
a great deal of patience, has said: ‘I would like to commend you on your guide, it has been incredibly
well researched and written, and you have managed to include an extensive range of materials and
facilities in a format that is very intuitive to use. You have clearly put in a great deal of hard work to
produce this document; I hope that you have a real sense of satisfaction for all your efforts. I would
like to share your guide with some of my colleagues if you are happy for me to do so.’.
This is a superb accolade to Jane and all her hard work.
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Here is a message from Weymouth and Portland u3a member Jane Church - a passionate advocate for the environment - who is working with the committee to set up and run a local "Three-R's" project – and is seeking your help to do so.
What’s in what you’re throwing out?
We know that we need to recycle more – but it’s not always easy to find out what can be recycled, and where. Putting the wrong items into the council’s kerbside recycling bins apparently cost Dorset residents £1.1 million in 2021, with whole batches of otherwise-recyclable material having to be sent to landfill (Dorset Echo, February 2022). The council household recycling plants will take and sort almost everything – but the main ones are inaccessible to those of us without cars.
Sometimes we can be tempted just to throw items away in our general waste bins – but do we always know how valuable those items are? Mobile phones, for example, contain precious metals and rare earths including gold, silver, platinum, aluminium and copper – many of which are mined in less-affluent countries with abysmal health, safety and environmental records – and are, of course, irreplaceable resources.
Luckily some organisations have recognised the value of such ‘waste’ items and will buy- or take- them back. But which organisations will do this - and where exactly 
are they? That’s what our new ‘Three-Rs’ project is all about - not the traditional ‘reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic’ Rs but the ones represented by the triangles that appear on packaging and products – ‘reduce, reuse and refurbish/recycle’ – the ones that represent a ‘circular economy’ where nothing goes to waste. The project is about producing ‘signposting’ information to less-well known recycling and refurbishment facilities in the area so that we are not left scratching our heads about who could possibly take some tricky ‘waste’ – and I am seeking your help to compile it.
So if you have found any local organisations that either buy- or take-back items such as mobile phones, pens, laptop batteries, soft plastics - in fact, anything that the local council cannot accept in our bins – especially organisations which might otherwise be ‘under our radars’ - please let me know who and where they are (as detailed an address as possible), and what they will take.
use the bluebird symbol opposite to connect automatically to the email for Jane's recycling. Whether you know of just one organization or fifty – I’ll be very pleased to hear from you.