page_title: Kerbside collection
section_title: Waste management and resource recovery
hierarchical_section_title: Kerbside collection / Waste management and resource recovery
caption_attribution_description: English: Residential recycling bin for Somerville, MA
context_page_description: Kerbside collection or curbside collection is a service provided to households, typically in urban and suburban areas, of collecting and disposing of household waste and recyclables. It is usually accomplished by personnel using specially built vehicles to pick up household waste in containers that are acceptable to, or prescribed by, the municipality and are placed on the kerb.
context_section_description: Kerbside collection is today often referred to as a strategy of local authorities to collect recyclable items from the consumer. Kerbside collection is considered a low-risk strategy to reduce waste volumes and increase the recycling rates. Recyclable materials are typically collected in large wheelie bins, plastic bags, or small open, coloured plastic boxes, specifically designated for content.
  Recyclable materials that may be separately collected from municipal waste include:
  Biodegradable waste component
  Green waste
  Kitchen and food waste
  Recyclable materials, depending on location
  Office paper
  Newsprint
  Paperboard
  Cardboard
  Corrugated fiberboard
  Plastics (#1 PET, #2 HDPE natural and colored, #3 PVC narrow-necked containers, #4 LDPE, #5  PP, #6 Polystyrene (however, not EXPANDED polystyrene, an example of recyclable polystyrene may be a plastic yoghurt pot) #7 other mixed resin plastics)
  Glass
  Copper
  Aluminium
  Steel and Tinplate
  Co-mingled recyclables- can be sorted by a clean materials recovery facility
  Kerbside collection of recyclable resources is aimed to recover purer waste streams with higher market value than by other collection methods. If the household residents incorrectly separate the recyclable materials, or put the wrong items in the recycling bin, the whole vehicle load of recycling will have to be rejected and sent to landfill or incineration if it is deemed to be contaminated.
  Kerbside collection and household recycling schemes are also being used as tools by many local authorities to increase the public's awareness of their waste production.
  Kerbside collection is commonly considered to be completely environmentally friendly. This may not necessarily be true as it leads to an increased number of waste collection vehicles on the road, in themselves contributing to traffic congestion, global warming and climate change through exhaust emissions of carbon dioxide until the time of their conversion to clean, sustainable energy, such as to use electric vehicles powered by batteries.
  New and emerging waste treatment technologies such as mechanical biological treatment may offer an alternative to kerbside collection through automated separation of waste in recycling factories.
caption: In Somerville, Massachusetts, all accepted paper, glass, plastic, and metal recyclables are collected from one recycling cart.
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