MONMOUTHSHIRE COMMUNITY RECYCLING

AIL-GYLCHU CYMUNEDOL SIR FYNWY

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Why do you cover some areas, but not others?
The Black Box Scheme is a pilot project, a totally new system for Monmouthshire when it started, and it was hard to know what would happen. Severnside and Chepstow were considered good areas to try the scheme out with the funding available at the time.  Monmouth and Abergavenny are similar in size and population to the pilot areas.  With only a limited amount of funding available, we could not buy enough boxes and vehicles to cover all of Monmouthshire, even if we were ready to.  Starting small, we have been able to improve the system without making too many costly commitments.

When will you cover the whole county?
It is one of our aims to offer a service to the whole county, but we realise that everywhere is different, and have started looking at ways of effectively collecting from villages and more rural areas. These rounds are working well, but do cost a bit more to run, especially with only one depot. As that depot is in Caldicot, it might be a while before we can reach parts of the North. We can add to some rounds when we have capacity, so feel free to ask if you want to be included.

Why don't you take plastic in all areas?
Our trucks, boxes and rounds have been set up to take most of what can be recycled by weight, and are not yet ready to take plastic. Plastics can be very hard to recycle - they are light, come in many different types which can't be mixed, and often have to be transported great distances for reprocessing. However plastic recycling is popular with residents, and an important way of reducing oil consumption and carbon emissions, so we have introduced collection in some areas. Currently these are Portskewett, Sudbrook, Leechpool, Crick, St Arvans, Devauden,parts of Caldicot, the Danes in Chepstow, Caerwent, most of the Wye Valley and parts of Abergavenny.

Can you take cardboard?
Cardboard should not normally be mixed with paper, as most mills recycle them as separate products.  However we have pilot areas where we collect both, with cardboard going into a different process - see the 'Collections' page for details of whether your area is covered.

Are you part of the Council? 
MCR operates the Black Box service on behalf of Monmouthshire County Council. We are a separate organisation and do have other projects that are not contracted by the council.

Are there any other schemes like MCR?
Monmouthshire has lots going on, including its own Waste Forum, with members such as Wormtech and Homemakers Community Recycling.  MCR as a community recycling organisation belongs to the networks CRN (UK) and Cylch (Wales CRN), with hundreds of members carrying out all kinds of waste reduction activities. Near to Monmouthshire, there are kerbside box schemes in Newport, Torfaen, Powys, Herefordshire, Bristol and Bath run by community recycling groups.  See our LINKS section for more information on these.