A to Z of reusing, recycling and waste disposal

Consider donating unwanted magazines and comics to your friends and relatives, colleagues or your local doctors surgery. You may even find that some comics have resale value. They can be recycled in your green recycling bin or at your nearest bring site or recycling centre. They will be made into new paper products.

Try to avoid using peat based compost as rare peat bog ecosystems are destroyed to make it. Instead why don't you make your own compost from fruit and vegetable peelings, grass cuttings, garden prunings and more. We are unable to take compostable bags in brown bins because under testing we found they do not fully decompose in garden waste within 12 weeks. These bags can be home composted or should be put in your black household waste bin. You can find out more information about how to make your own compost and the compost bins we offer on the composting page.

Contact, a Leeds community interest company, are always looking for donations of unwanted computer equipment. They refurbish them for use by other not-for-profit and community organisations or recycle the materials. Their telephone number is 0113 242 4421. Computers from your home can also be taken to your nearest recycling centre. Please put them in the electronic equipment skip. Materials such as plastics and metals are recycled into new products.

Please remember that used cooking oil can be recycled and made into biodiesel. Please do not pour it down the drain. To recycle your cooking oil please take to your nearest recycling centre and put it in the used cooking oil container. It will be used to create bio-diesel or as a fuel in an energy from waste facility.

You can take broken crockery to your local recycling centre where you should put it in the rubble and inerts skip. It will be used for road building or surface cover on a landfill site. Restrictions apply for disposing of some types of rubbish at our household recycling sites including ceramics. To find out more please see our guide to DIY waste disposal.

Please see Chemicals

Garden Waste includes grass cuttings, clippings, hedge prunings and small branches. The most environmentally friendly way of dealing with your garden waste is to compost the material and return it to the land on the site it was produced. Please see Compost, Composts Bins and Compostable Bags for more information. The best way of managing waste from large hedges, trees and shrubs is to invest in a wood chipper, which allows the production of a mulch material. This can be added to your compost heaps/bins or used directly on your garden as a weed suppressant. Mulch is also very effective at retaining moisture in the soil. By composting and creating mulch, householders even with very large gardens should be able manage their garden waste. We provide fortnightly garden waste collections throughout the growing season to certain areas of the city. Please do not put larger twigs and branches in your brown garden waste bin. You can also take garden waste to your nearest recycling centre. If you are unable to do this, you can request a bulky waste collection online for up to 4 bags of double bagged garden waste or up to 4 bundles of wood and branches (which should not be more than 2m long). Any nails/screws need to be removed. Please note that the service will not collect garden waste if you have a brown garden waste bin.

Gas bottles and cylinders can be extremely dangerous when in the wrong hands, so should not be left around after use. Please do not put unwanted gas cylinders or bottles in your black bin. We do not accept gas cylinders at any of our recycling centres. Most gas bottles and cylinders remain the property of the supplier. The supplier’s name will be printed on the item – the most common ones are Calor, BOC and Flogas. Calor gas bottles can be returned to any Calor stockist. If you have the original receipt, you can claim your deposit back. If you are unable to return them yourself, you can arrange a collection free of charge by calling 0113 307 9050 BOC will collect their cylinders free of charge. Please call 0330 162 1291 to arrange collection. Flogas will collect their cylinders free of charge. Please call 0800 574 574 and hold to arrange collection If you have a gas bottle or cylinder that is unbranded or you are unsure of its contents, you can email a picture of it toemail@synrec.co.uk for identification and advice on disposal or telephone National LPG and Industrial Gas Cylinder recovery on 0800 083 9652.

You can re-use sheets of glass by using them to make row covers (cloches) for gardening. Please do not put sheets of glass into bottle banks. You can dispose of sheet glass by taking it to your nearest recycling centre where you should put it in the non-recyclable waste container. If you are unable to do this you can request a bulky waste collection online. Please wrap the glass sheets to protect our collection crew. This will then be disposed of to landfill.

Washed and clean glass jars can be used again for storing homemade jam, pickles, herbs and other foodstuffs. Wine and beer bottles can be re-used in home brewing. Empty glass bottles and jars of any colour can be placed in your green recycling bin, or taken to a glass bank or recycling centre. Give them a quick rinse first, leave caps and lids on and they'll get recycled too. Glass recycled in green bins and bottle banks is 100% re-melted in Yorkshire and can be back on the shelf as a new bottle or jar within 30 days. Glass items such as light bulbs, drinking glasses and Pyrex containers should not be put into green bins or bottle banks. If these items are good enough to re-use, please take them to your local charity shop. If they are not, wrap them in paper and throw them away in your black rubbish bin.

Many opticians collect unwanted spectacles for re-use in the developing world. Please ask your local optician about this.

Please see Garden Waste.

Please see Cards.