Recycling vs. throwing away

Friday is our trash pick up day. For the entire house, we throw away 1 full kitchen bag of trash a week. That's about 1/6 of what we used to throw away back in the States -- even with recycling paper and glass (until it was discontinued).

I did know a few people back in Georgia for whom recycling was too much of a bother and they just threw everything away. Here, you have no choice. Recycling is the law. Refuse to recycle and pay the consequences. And pay you will.

What makes the recycling system work so well is that the German government has made it all so easy for the consumer. Firstly, companies pay fees based on how much packaging they use for their products and how much of it is recyclable. This has been the biggest inspiration for much less, more recyclable packaging.

There are recycling receptacles in two spots a five-minute walk from our house. That's where we take our glass. We used to also take paper and cardboard there, but we have recently been provided with a large paper bin on wheels that is put out once a month for collection. We put paper, cardboard, magazines, glossy flyers and wrapping paper in it.

People often compost their vegetable and fruit scraps, cutting down even more on the amount of trash. In addition, you can arrange to have the city pick up bulk trash (furniture for example) and broken electronics on designated days, free of charge. Return plastic soda/mineral water bottles to the store and a significant deposit will be handed back to you.

And then, there is the the Gelbe Sack.

The Gelbe Sack, or yellow bag, is for virtually all of the rest of your packaging: plastic containers, aluminum cans, "composite" beverage cartons (cardboard-ish with a waxy coating), plastic food wrapping, metal spray cans, Styrofoam, etc. To make things just a bit easier, you are not expected to wash out what you put in the Gelbe Sack and you get the Sacks free of charge at the town hall. We usually put out 4 bags for the bi-monthly pick up.

As an example of how we recycle, say you finish a box of cereal. Break down the box, throw it in the paper/cardboard bin and then put the plastic bag that was inside the box into the Gelbe Sack.

Finish a bag of pretzels, chips or grapes. Just throw the bag into the Gelbe Sack.

Suppose you just bought a vegetable/rice steamer at the store (guilty). Break down the box, throw it in the paper/cardboard bin, put the styrofoam and plastic bags the directions and pieces of the steamer came in into the Gelbe Sack.

You make a sandwich and used up the last of the mayo, cheese and bread. Throw the bread bag, metal twisties from the bag, cheese container and the lid to the mayo into the Gelbe Sack. Wash out the mayo jar and walk it to the recycling receptacle.

You haven't thrown anything away.

Here's a trickier one. You ordered pizza from the local pizzeria. The pizza box has grease on the bottom. You're not supposed to recycle soiled paper/cardboard. Rip out the soiled section, throw it away, but recycle the rest.

We were intimidated by it all when we first moved here. Receiving a 20-page recycling instruction booklet from our relocation agent just served to confuse even more. Now, it's all old hat.