THERE’S ALWAYS AT least one paper or plastic item that you can’t remember if you can recycle or not.

This makes things tricky on two levels – on an individual level, it’s confusing for people who want to reduce their household waste, and on a macro level, it means that recyclable items are being thrown in as waste when Ireland is trying to reduce its emissions.

So the government has decided to help people out by compiling a definitive list of recyclable items. This is the first single national standard list of items that you can recycle.

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Rigid Plastics

• Plastic drink bottles
• Plastic cleaning bottles
• Butter, yoghurt and salad tubs
• Fruit and veg trays
• Plastic milk cartons
• Soap or shampoo bottles

Tins & Cans

• Soup cans
• Pet food cans
• Drink cans
• Food cans

Paper and cardboard

• Letters and brochures
• Cardboard boxes
• Egg boxes
• Toilet & kitchen roll
• Newspapers
• Tetra pak juice or milk cartons

You can view the full list here.

The site also has a Q&A section about why some items aren’t on the recyclable list:

Coffee cups: A disposable coffee cup is made from paper but has a plastic lining that is difficult to remove, so coffee cups must go in your black bin.

Paper towels/napkins: These items are usually made from recycled paper that can only be recycled a limited number of times. You can put them in your compost bin.

Glass: Glass is 100% recyclable, however, glass does not go in the recycle bin. Glass should be placed in glass/bottle banks.

Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Denis Naughten said that he hoped the list would remove the confusion and improve “the quality of the material that goes in the recycle bin”.

“This will help to ensure that these items are actually recycled, as opposed to being contaminated accidentally by householders and sent to landfill.

The list of suitable material is now simply paper, cardboard, rigid plastics, tins and cans.

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