Recycling/biodegradable products

[Jacks50]

Hello,

I wonder if anyone might be able to help with this.

We're organising our school fair and want to avoid all the waste from plastic 'glasses' and coffee cups.

One option is biodegradable cups/'glasses' but I can't find out how to actually get rid of the biodegradable products.

I phoned southwark and they said its either recycling, or its rubbish, so I guess they can't take them.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks so much

[yeknomyeknom]

Biodegradable product should be compostable. The school could start a compost area, alternatively local allotments often have compost areas and take in suitable material.

[katanita]

Biodegradable materials are not necessarily compostable, and compostable materials are not necessarily compostable at home. This is a long but interesting article on the subject https://www.growingcommunities.org/blog/2018/11/packaging-update-reuse-reuse-reuse and an article on misleading claims about biodegradability in plastic products https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/29/biodegradable-plastic-bags-survive-three-years-in-soil-and-sea.

That's not very hopeful, sorry! Maybe someone here has deeper knowledge and can suggest something but I suspect the best solution is to encourage people to bring their own?

[womanofdulwich]

Why don't you just use real cups? The type you have to wash up after? You can free hire glasses from supermarkets.

[Jellybeanz]

paper cups and plates can be recycled

[katanita]

Jellybeanz Wrote:

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> paper cups and plates can be recycled

Even if dirty/used? I didn't think that was the case but would be very happy to be proven wrong. Also some are plastic coated I believe so would not be.

[seenbeen]

yeknomyeknom Wrote:

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> Biodegradable product should be compostable. The

> school could start a compost area, alternatively

> local allotments often have compost areas and take

> in suitable material.

You would think so but I came across a 'biodegradable' M and S carrier from years ago and it had done was disintegrated into a million tiny green bits of plastic- more harmful to wildlife in my opinion. I have a magazine wrapper from English Heritage and it is made of potato starch and it says to put it into the compost NOT the plastic waste.

[Jacks50]

Thank you all so much! I've managed to find some paper cups that don't have the plastic inside bit so I can recycle them. Phew! Thank you all again, very much!