I've been meaning to write about this for some time now. Throwing rubbish back in homeland was pretty rudimentary. Both the Mister and I were impressed and confused, at the same time, when we first moved here. Impressed - there are rules, yes.. but everyone around us/we knew follows! Confused - I have stood by the rubbish dump debating silently which bin does a milk carton belongs to. Why? Because a milk carton is mostly cardboard-like material BUT the screw caps aren't - they are plastic!! Laugh all you want... it was a real dilemma.
So let's start with the most used Brown bin :) Food Waste bin has its' own big & small brown paper bags. Small ones for daily indoor use and big ones for the outside huge accumulator bin. You can basically dump in anything that is biodegradable, i.e the watermelon skins, fish bones, that piece of paper napkin. Basically, nothing non-organic.
Paper Waste bin is the big blue bin. It has its own big plastic bag. We throw in everything paper & cardboard, like the week's special at Spar, unwanted letters, etc.
Now when I say all things plastic, it doesn't include drinks bottles that we paid for at a local store. Like Farris (local beverage brand), bring it back to where it is sold and you get back some money :) This also applies to some of the beverages in aluminium tin cans. It could be a machine like the one in the picture but at the airports, we have returned it to the store we bought the beverage from and managed to get cash back.
Now, here's the tricky part. The rest of the rubbish does not include everything else. Electronic things like TV, can be disposed at the local electronic store in Flekkefjord. Medicinal waste must be brought to the local pharmacy. Glass & metal wastes must be thrown at designated containers, such as these ones right opposite Amfi,
Aside from that, Special Waste such as car batteries, old pots & pans, broken lamps CANNOT be disposed at home. For us in Flekkefjord & around, we take a drive to Erikstemmen. Do check their opening times before you drive all the way there. And before you start throwing things out randomly, you have to approach the counter and PAY for what you are going to dispose of. The folks there will tell you roughly where each containers for different category of wastes are. This place is huge, safe to speak. It is quite amazing, really, they are very serious about this.
P/s: Remember the milk carton? According to the sortere.no site, it doesn't matter if there is a plastic screw top (because a machine will manage it), it belongs to the Paper/Cardboard bin :) And also, apparently if you wash, dry & fold 6-7 into one empty milk carton, you could write your name & phone number & throw it as per norm to try your luck at a national lucky draw. :p Talk about incentives!
In the recycling groove,
ABE