Kerbside Recycling Collection

Why recycle?

The things we buy and use take a lot of energy and resources to create. When we throw away these things in the landfill, we waste the energy and resources that went into them. By recycling, we can give these materials another life. 

Using your crates

1. Can you recycle it?

Check below or download our recycling and rubbish guide here

2. Wash, remove lids and flatten cardboard

Wash out jars, bottles and cans; remember no food or liquids.

3. Sort your recycling into your three crates

Each household within the Hastings kerbside recycling zone has three crates for recycling. Recycling will only be collected in Council-issued crates. You can put out multiple crates with the same items (for example two crates of paper), but don’t mix the different categories in the same crate.

Separate items into the following categories:

4. Stop before the top

Don’t overfill your recycling crates.

Recycling outside of the crates will not be collected, for example large cardboard boxes.

If you have excess recycling, you can save it and put it out another week or take it to one of our free recycling drop off centres

If it’s windy, pop your glass crate on top of your plastics and cans crate, so items don't blow onto the street. For your paper crate, put a brick on top.

5. Kerbside by 7am

Place your recycling out at the kerbside by 7AM ON YOUR COLLECTION DAY. Place crates as close to the kerb edge as possible; not in the middle of the footpath.

What you can (and can’t!) put in your crates

Paper and cardboard

Clean and flattened paper and cardboard. Large cardboard boxes can be dropped for free at our recycling depots or cut them down to fit in your crate.

Plastic and cans

Number 1, 2 & 5 household plastics, food and drink cans.

Wash, squash, lids off.

TOP TIP: Sustainable HB can also take metal jar lids, aluminium screw caps, metal bottle tops, coffee capsules, Colgate oral care products, aluminium foil and trays, batteries and Glad brand food wrap, ziplock bags and food storage containers.

Glass

Empty, clean glass bottles and jars.

The recycling teams will not empty bins that weigh more than 10kgs.

Why crates?

Using crates to separate items ensures we have the cleanest recycling possible and the high quality of the material collected will guarantee it will be recycled.
Separating recycling also allows paper and cardboard to be collected separately and dropped directly where it needs to go, saving double handling and transport emissions.

Why not wheelie bins?

While wheelie bins are very simple to use, the quality of recycling that comes out of the mixed recycling wheelie bins is much lower. It’s also a lot more difficult to separate items and therefore costs more to process. In Hastings, it is especially important to keep our glass separate from paper and cardboard which is sent locally to Hawk Packaging and made into fruit trays. For health and safety reasons, there can’t be any fragments of glass in it.

Why having the wrong thing in your crate is a problem

Sometimes eager recyclers may want to recycle things we don’t collect through our kerbside collection. But there are really good reasons not to do that.
Your recycling may get left behind if the wrong things are in your crate. We know this is frustrating when you were trying to do the right thing. The ultimate aim is to be able to make new products – and mixing them or including the wrong items means this does not happen.

Where Hastings' recycling goes

Plastic and cans

Plastics (numbered 1, 2 and 5) and cans are transported to Masterton for sorting in a materials recovery facility. These materials are sold locally and internationally. For example, clear PET plastics (#1) generally go to a number of plastic manufacturers in NZ like Flight Plastics in Wellington and are made into fruit punnets or meat trays. Cans are generally sold to other countries where there is more demand for these metals.

Glass

Glass goes to the Visy recycling company in Auckland. Visy processes the glass into new bottles and jars. Within about four weeks, the glass can be back in a retail store as a new bottle or jar.

Paper and cardboard

Paper and cardboard goes to Hawk Packaging in Whakatū where it is made into fruit trays. It gets processed straight away on the same day it is collected from your crate.

For more information about kerbside recycling, see the Ministry for the Environment’s webpage here.

Check out the Waste-Ed with Kate video below to see the journey of glass recycling in New Zealand.