Bristol’s cupping amazing!
Cup recycling saves half a million cups from waste
Since we launched our For Cups Sake campaign back in February 2020, thousands of Bristol residents have been using our cup recycling bins across the city to save hundreds of thousands of disposable cups from going to waste.
To date, we have;
- collected 5.6 tonnes of cups
- recycled over 465,000 cups
- turned all that into half a million paper products
- and planted 50 new trees!
In the UK three billion disposable cups are thrown away each year, less than 4% are currently recycled. That means that every day, approximately 7.5 million coffee cups are disposed of as litter!
Trees for cups
As well as giving a cup another life, using one of our bins also has local environmental benefits. We teamed up with Bristol City Council’s One Tree Per Child Bristol to plant a tree for every 10,000 cups recycled.
That means not only will new trees not be used to make new items, but we’ll be planting 50 new trees in Bristol thanks to all those recycling their cups!
More cup bins incoming...
Building on the success of the campaign to date, starting this month, we are putting cup bins in the local hospitals. Working with University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust.
You can find cup recycling bins in various locations in the Trust including the Bristol Royal Infirmary (BRI), Bristol Royal Hospital for Children, Bristol Eye Hospital (BEH), Bristol Dental Hospital, St Michael’s Hospital (STMH), Weston General Hospital and the Education Centre building.
The new bins will be in communal areas allowing patients, visitors and staff to recycle their cups on the go.
Grabbing your reusable cup isn’t always the first thing on your mind when visiting a hospital. However, a comforting cup of tea can make a huge difference. The new bins will help patients, visitors and staff take care of the environment, while the NHS take care of us.
Gwen Frost, Head of Sustainability & Innovation at Bristol Waste
