West Berkshire Council and Veolia Environmental Services are encouraging residents to take their disused or broken electrical goods to the Newtown Road Household Waste Recycling Centre, Newbury in order to raise awareness of the facilities available to recycle your unwanted e-clutter and electrical goods.

Even better, residents have until 19 July to vote for their favourite West Berkshire school with every old electrical item brought to the recycling centre. The winning school with the most votes will win a selection of energy-saving gadgets and prizes!

Small electricals like old kettles and mobile phones may not be top of the household sort out, but research  shows on average we all have at least three unwanted electronic items cluttering up the home – and that’s before digging around in the cupboards. Last year alone 154 million  small electrical products were bought in the UK, but only around 10% of them were recycled.  

The Community Furniture Project operate a donation point at the Newtown Road Household Waste Recycling Centre and will accept any electrical items from toothbrushes to household fridges. They will even accept broken items, as their staff are able to mend and safety test these goods, for sale in one of the two community furniture shops in West Berkshire. Any goods or parts of electrical items that cannot be reused can be easily salvaged for recycling instead of potentially ending in landfill. A typical iron contains enough steel to make 13 food tins.

Hilary Cole, West Berkshire Executive Councillor for the Environment, added “Small electrical items are often forgotten about and end up in household waste bin. Working alongside Veolia and the Community Furniture Project allows West Berkshire Council to start reversing this trend, working towards a Cleaner, Greener West Berkshire.”

Kelvin Hughes, the Chief Executive of the Community Furniture Project, commented, “Here at the Community Furniture Project we work closely alongside the Council and Veolia to help provide greener waste and reuse services for the local community and divert valuable materials, including electrical items away from landfill.”

Tracey Reilly, General Manager for Veolia in West Berkshire, said: “Our aim is to encourage as many people as possible to do their bit for the environment by recycling even more of their waste.  In this case, our facilities at the Household Waste Recycling Centre allow residents to bring their old electrical goods for reuse or recycling, making it easy for residents to increase recycling and send even less waste to landfill.”

The Newtown Road Household Waste Recycling Centre is open between 8.30 am and 7.30 pm seven days a week. For more information about electrical recycling, please contact West Berkshire Council Customer Services team on 01635 519080, email customerservices@westberks.gov.uk. Alternatively visit http://www.westberks.gov.uk.

I took a whole pile of old electrical stuff up there the other day after clearing out a friend's father's shed. He was one of the old school who never threw anything away and had electrical stuff going back to the post war and possibly earlier years. The guys at the specialist goods bit were really helpful and cheerful and took all the junk as if it was new from Curry's. Well done to them.
I have also found the guys round the corner on the skips really pleasant and helpful but woe betide you if you don't abide by the rules, they don't suffer fools gladly as the guy who thought it OK tp parallel park over three slots rather than backing in to a marked slot found out. He was firmly told to put his stuff back in his boot and park in the appropriate and designated way.

Good to hear.  Fits what I've noticed, the centre does seem to work and even at busy times never waited too long.  I must admit I'm pleased they make people stick to the rules.  At the old one, selfish parking was often the cause of major delays.  However, so far, this seems to be something in Newbury that works and works well.

Last time I went there, it wasn't busy - there were about 5 or 6 parking bays empty in the main area. Up trundles a yummy mummy in her huge 4x4. Doesn't reverse into the bay like you're meant to, no, she tries to park front first, squeezing between 2 other cars. Messes it up (as you would), angles herself better and has another go. I left at that point, but no doubt she would have had just a hard time getting out again. I could see eye rolling from the operators and some of the other drivers.