Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2021 July 28

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July 28

Colour-coded waste containers

In Finland, waste containers are colour-coded.

• Grey: Mixed waste
• Green: Paper
• Blue: Cardboard
• Brown: Biodegradable waste
• Yellow: Plastic

Is this some kind of international standard or is it just Finland only? JIP | Talk 02:56, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

What colour is steel (tin cans) and aluminium?
Sleigh (talk) 04:31, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

There is no international standard for the classes of recyclables, let alone for how corresponding receptacles are coded.  --Lambiam 05:52, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

In the UK, bin colours can vary between councils. There's quite a good explanation here [1]. I live three miles away from my mum but we're under different councils and have different bins. Princess Persnickety (talk) 09:28, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

Some larger UK councils have invested in large machines which sort the waste like this (no idea how they work) and so anything recyclable (paper, glass, metal, plastic) all goes in a single bin. Alansplodge (talk) 18:24, 29 July 2021 (UTC)

In NL, the municipalities not only decide the colours, but even the number of different containers/streams (but some neighbouring municipalities may pool waste management). More rural places tend to have more, as people have more room to store those containers and appear to be more disciplined in their use. In some larger cities, the biodegradable waste had so much plastic mixed in that the city decided to stop separate collection. Generally though, biodegradable waste is in green, paper and cardboard in blue and plastic in orange. Steel and aluminium cans are often mixed with something else (often plastic), as those can easily be separated magnetically later. PiusImpavidus (talk) 13:34, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

There is absolutely no system in the U.S. Waste collection is generally managed at the municipality level; in places of sparse population there may not even be any waste collection system and people may be expected to bring their own trash to the landfill themselves, though this is rarer today than it used to be. Where I live, in Raleigh, North Carolina, we have two bins: one for trash (which is either olive drab or green depending on how old the container is) and one for comingled recyclables (which is blue). --Jayron32 15:02, 29 July 2021 (UTC)

In a French railway station in Lorraine I saw this:

Dark green: glass;

Light blue: plastic bottles, drink cartons, cans;

Dark blue: paper;

Black: the rest.

In Belgian railway stations in the Namur and Liège areas I saw:

Orange: paper;

Green: glass;

Blue: plastic;

Blush: the rest.

The same code may be used by the municipalities in collecting household recyclables and garbage, put on the sidewalks in appropriately coloured bags.  --Lambiam 21:33, 29 July 2021 (UTC)