Ealing Council's recycling and rubbish collections

❌ Polystyrene cannot be recycled because it is difficult to sort from other types of plastic waste and easily breaks into small beads which can clog up sorting machines and cause them to break down.

Someone in Ealing hid this polystyrene in a black bag in their blue recycling bin - this was found in a heavily contaminated load that was rejected and had to be paid to go to general rubbish 👎🏽

If you find a tag on your recycling bin it means the crew has found items that cannot be recycled and would contaminate Ealing’s recycling. Too many contaminants means the entire truck load is rejected. This costs £££ and the climate.

🔗 You can find information about white contamination tags here: www.ealing.gov.uk/galleries/gallery/40/white_tag_-_sticker_meanings

Please avoid buying things wrapped with polystyrene. If you do end up with polystyrene, then it should be disposed in your rubbish black bin or taken to Greenford Road reuse and recycling centre.

🔗 Discover what you could drop off at Greenford by visiting: www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201171/recycling_services/292/re-use_and_recycling_centres_and_sites

Don’t forget to book your drop-off slot! ✅

There will be two school uniform swaps this Saturday - one in Acton and the other in Southall 👏🏽

Here are the details for the Southall swap (check out our post earlier in the week for the swap in Acton).

Southall Uniform Swap
🕙 10 am- midday
🗓️ Saturday 25 April
📍 Southall Manor House Cafe, Outside Manor House Grounds, The Green, Southall, UB2 4BJ

The ReActon School Uniform Free-Swap Shop now has hundreds of items of good quality, pre-loved school uniform waiting to be worn again ☺️

There are branded and unbranded items, clothing for secondary and primary schools and plenty of different sizes to choose between. This means that all Ealing families can save money, carbon, water and pollution by joining the circular economy revolution that is happening around local school uniform.

Southall Free School Uniform event runs once a month on the last Saturday of the month at Manor House Cafe Outside Manor House Grounds, The Green, Southall, UB2 4BJ. From 10 am – 12 noon.

Pick up to up to 5 school uniform items per child for free.

🔗 Learn more here: https://actforealing.org/ealing-school-uniform-swap/

Keep an eye on this channel for the dates and locations of future uniform swaps.

Here’s to celebrating our only home - planet earth! 🌍

Today is a reminder that small everyday actions add up. By buying less and thinking more about how best to deal with our old stuff we all help protect the planet we share:
- check what goes in your recycling
- make the most of your leftover food
- use your food caddy for food that truly can’t be eaten
- learn to repair with a local repair cafe
- find a new home for what you no longer use
- borrow/share stuff rather than buying new (and cheap)
- buy only what you need
- choose reusables where possible

Together, these simple steps help cut waste, save resources and keep Ealing cleaner and greener for everyone — today and every day.

🔗 Discover more at: www.earthday.org

Take a moment to enjoy your favourite corner of Ealing and let us know how you will protect it this earth day 🌏

🔔 Join the April ReActon reuse and repair event in Acton this Saturday!

🕚 11 am-2 pm
🗓️ Saturday 25 April
📍 ReActon, Stirling Road, W3 8DJ

Come along to get reusing and repairing with ReActon at Stirling Road in Acton. We will have lots of reuse and repair activities that all the family can get involved with. Book activities here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/cc/reacton-repair-and-reuse-event-4116853

Activities on the day include:
👔 free school uniform - high school & primary. Learn more about the Ealing free school uniform - https://actforealing.org/ealing-school-uniform-swap/
🧵 learn to repair your clothes with Ealing Repair café from 11am-1 pm
🪡 upcycle t-shirts into yarn and bracelets with Ealing Repair café from 11-1 pm
🎨 free household paint for DIY projects
🚲 bike maintenance and small repairs
📕 book swap

Donate for reuse and repair your:
✅ clean, good quality clothes
✅ clothes hangers
✅ small e-waste items (that fit into a standard plastic bag)
✅ Terracycle recycling
✅ ReActon Reuse and Repair Event

🍃 The refreshed garden waste service is being rolled out for 2026/27

This year, garden waste subscribers will receive an either a bin sticker or a bag tag. Once a subscription has been paid for, the tags or stickers will arrive by post within 5-10 working days ✉️

It is important that residents fit their stickers or tags properly to their bins or sacks. Bins and sacks without stickers or tags will not be collected by the garden waste collection crews.

This handy guide provides clear instructions on how to fit your stickers and tags properly ⬆️

🗓️ Also, all garden waste subscribers should check their collection days as they may have changed since last year. The bin stickers tell you exactly when to leave your garden waste out for collection and collection days can also be found online - check out the details below.

The Ealing website will allow you to:
🔗 find your collection day information: www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201167/rubbish_and_recycling/2015/find_your_rubbish_and_recycling_collection…
🔗 report a missed collection: www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201167/rubbish_and_recycling/2016/report_a_missed_bin_collection
🔗 discover what can go in your garden waste bin: www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201169/garden_waste_and_composting/287/garden_waste_collection

📑 Did you know that shredded paper is just not something that makes it through the recycling process - it’s just too small. Only items that are roughly the diameter of a tennis ball make it through the sorting process. The other problem is that all those tiny bits of loose paper can actually jam up recycling machinery.

HOWEVER….there is a way to make sure your shredded paper makes it through to be recycled ♻️

Next time you have a paper bag or large envelope (that doesn’t need shredding) use it to store your shredded paper. Once it’s full, seal it up and pop it in your blue recycling bin.

Your lovely paper-filled envelope will then make it to the paper sorting process where the machinery will recognise it as a paper envelope and sort it for paper recycling.

As always....when in doubt, the wonderful people Recycle Now have all the information you need, just visit: www.recyclenow.com

Another money saving app that also tackles food waste in the borough - Olio! 🎉

OLIO - Share More, Waste Less brings out the climate hero in all of us by connecting us with local shops giving away free food and neighbours trying to find new homes for things like food, toiletries, books and toys.

So if you want to bag a bargain or declutter or find a home for food you won’t be using - check out the Olio app. According to Olio, stuff typically finds a new home in 2 hours!! (We’d love to know your experience of this.)

🔗 This video explains how Olio works - https://youtu.be/75sG9AjCMXw?si=QRlikR0Mwn4f8z5L
Or visit: https://olioapp.com/en/

If finding a bargain, decluttering and saving our planet wasn’t enough, you can also volunteer to join the thousands of Food Waste Heroes who rescue unsold food to be eaten not binned. Learn more here: https://volunteers.olioex.com/

Local upcycling to support local biodiversity - the Ealing Biodiversity Awards for Gardens and Green Spaces 2026 - combines the sustainability dream of less "stuff" and more nature 🌻

The team loves this tip from a local green thumbed upcycler, "Try making planters out of disused household objects like old wellies, plastic water bottles, tin cans, pans and cracked/chipped crockery.” ✅

This is the third year of this brilliant local award from Cultivating Ealing that celebrates local green spaces. It doesn't matter how small the green space, from window sill planters to front gardens to community streetscapes, allotments and schools, anything could win a prize!

There are plenty more ideas from Upcycle my stuff just visit: https://upcyclemystuff.com/47-upcycled-planter-ideas-that-are-easy-to-make/

To learn more about the award visit: www.cultivatingealing.uk/2026-competition

The deadline for the entry categories is:
- 21 May for Schools
- 5 June for Allotments
- 3 July for Front gardens, terraces, micro gardens and balconies
- 3 July for Community Spaces & Streets

This award is supported by Act for Ealing, Ealing Council, Greener Ealing Limited , Leslie & Co Tom Boswell Tree Services

🤔 Can you guess the top 5 most prevalent sources of litter......please scroll down to see if you guessed correctly. (Thanks to Keep Britain Tidy for their analysis.)

The brilliant volunteers at the Acton Litter Collective would certainly know. This fabulous group has made a real difference to the streets of Acton 👏🏽

One local praised the impact of the group saying, “While walking home last night there was a total absence of litter. Spectacularly clean. Huge thank you to everyone who constantly works hard to make Acton a pleasant place to live.”

There are litter picking groups all over Ealing - LAGER Can and CURB - so next time you notice a sparkling street in Ealing, please give some thought to thanking the amazing volunteers who do so much to tackle local litter.

If you want to make a difference to the Acton community, please join the Acton Litter Collective that meets:
📍 Saturdays at 9.00am at Mill Hill Surgery (W3 8QH)
📍 Sundays at 9.30am at Mint Cafe in Acton Gardens (W3 8UU)
Any questions about joining the Acton Litter Collective please call 07762 268494.

🔗 OR check out other local litter busting groups as follows:
- by visiting: www.lagercan.co.uk/contact-us
- by visiting: www.brentriverpark.org/campaigns/curbs/

The best thing we can all do is to stop the litter at source, so what ideas do you have to reduce the following BIG FIVE*:
1️⃣ Cigarette butts
2️⃣ Sweets and chocolate wrappers
3️⃣ Drinks bottles and cans
4️⃣ Fast‑food packaging
5️⃣ Crisps and snack packets

We’d love to hear your ideas!💡

*www.keepbritaintidy.org/about-us/news-and-media/rubbish-reality-new-report-reveals-shocking-scale-l…

👀 If anyone spots any street cleansing issues from dead animals to spilled oil to litter pick bags to green waste bags, please let us know so we can send out our crews to tidy up.

The team does not always know about these issues unless they are reported using the Ealing website reporting tool. If these issues are left for too long they can end up getting worse. So please don’t assume someone else has reported the issue. Please take 5 minutes to log on to your MyAccount on the Ealing Council website to report any street cleansing issues you have come across ➡️

The crews will do their best to deal with the issue as quickly as possible.

🔗 Visit this page to report any street cleansing issues: www.ealing.gov.uk/info/201153/street_care_and_cleaning/2853/report_a_street_cleaning_problem

HUGE congratulations and thanks to for being such brilliant local contributors to the brilliant Keep Britain Tidy Great Big School Clean 👏🏽

Led by their wonderful eco-lead teacher (who deserves a massive round of applause), pupils completed two litter picks during two lunch time outings around their school car park and local streets. The children absolutely loved getting involved and making a difference to their local community 🚮

Not only are these fabulous pupils learning the importance of contributing to their community, but they are also learning about the importance of stopping litter at source. They have seen first-hand how much litter comes from food packaging and careless disposal.

These pupils will be sharing what they learned with their families and communities, encouraging the careful use of litter bins and not buying so much “stuff” that just ends up as litter polluting our communities and damaging local wildlife🍃

Please join the team in a round of applause for these litter-busting mini-heroes! 👏🏽

Please get in touch if there is a school in your life that would like its own litter picking kit ⬇️

We're on the final stretch now! 🙌🏾

All we need are some Easter eggs to be finished and then the foil ball we have all been watching will finally be ready to join the circular economy! 🍫

It's nearly the size of a tennis ball, it's been properly smooshed together by a couple of nine year olds, so soon it will be time to send it on its way to a new future as more foil or perhaps a drinks can or even an aeroplane - the options for recycled aluminium are endless.

The best fact about using recycled aluminium is that recycling aluminium uses 10% of the energy compared to making aluminium from raw materials.*⚡️

So don't let those Easter egg foil wrappers go to waste - the power of the blue recycling bin awaits!

🔗 If you want to learn more about the power of aluminium recycling - check out this page from experts by visiting this webpage: * www.wastemanaged.co.uk/our-news/recycling/recycling-aluminium/