What can I recycle?
If your recycling is not in the correct container it will not be collected.
Recycling bags and containers
Blue boxes and white sacks can be collected from:
- Stockton Library, Stockton Town Centre, TS18 1TU
- Thornaby Library, Thornaby Town Centre, TS17 9EP
- Billingham Library, Billingham Town Centre, TS23 2LN
Garden waste bags can also be purchased for £4 each.
We are currently out of stock of white hessian bags in all 3 centres.
Blue box - glass and batteries
We accept the following waste materials for recycling:
- glass bottles and jars (clear, green and brown)
- batteries (within their own clear bag)
White Hessian Sacks - plastic, cardboard, cans and paper
Plastics
- Any plastic bottles (such as empty milk and pop bottles, cooking oil, washing up, laundry liquids, shampoo, toiletry and baby care bottles)
- Clean yoghurt pots, margarine and butter tubs
- Liquid food and drink cartons (such as those made by Tetra-Pak)
- Pot noodle pots
- Plant pots
- Hard, rigid plastic (such as children's toys or pen casings)
- Any plastic contaminated with food waste
- Black plastic bags
- Carrier bags
- Crisp packets
- Plastic microwave meal trays
- Plastic meat trays
- Plastic toothpaste tubes
- Polystyrene
Cardboard and cans
- Cereal boxes
- Greetings cards (including glittery ones)
- Any brown cardboard (such as toilet/kitchen roll tubes)
- General cardboard packaging (such as shoe boxes)
- Corrugated packaging (such as Pringle Tubes, cardboard egg boxes and clean frozen food boxes)
- Aluminium/steel tins and cans
- Aluminium foil
- Aerosols (fully extinguished)
- Any cardboard contaminated by food (such as pizza boxes)
Paper
- Paper
- Newspapers
- Magazines
- Catalogues
- Telephone directories
- Junk mail
- Envelopes
Soft plastics recycling
Soft plastics including bread bags and crisps packets can now be recycled at libraries across the borough including Stockton Central, Billingham Central, Thornaby Central, Norton and Ingleby Barwick.
Soft plastics that can be recycled include:
- Biscuits and chocolate wrapping
- Bread bags
- Bubble wrap and cling film
- Cereal box liners
- Crisp and sweet bags
- Delivery bags
- Frozen food bags
- Multi-pack wrapping
- Plastic carrier bags
- Salad, pasta, and rice bags
- Toilet roll wrapping
All plastics should be cleaned before being recycled.