It's an ongoing debate in our house as to if we should still put out an almost empty bin for weekly collection. I feel we should only put it out when it's full, but my partner believes we should continue the weekly routine.
Our bin pretty much goes out every week for kerbside collection and since reducing our waste, it probably would take 6 months to come close to filling it. Our Recycle bin is usually 3/4 full (although we are working on this) and goes out fortnightly and our green organics bin is maybe a 1/4 full but always goes out fortnightly due to the smell (it's pretty gross).
I suspect our weekly bin routine is a bit of a hangover from all the years in the past that we had overly full bins and the panic that came on bin night if we couldn't fit it all in. We took turns jumping on our trash and even resorted to sneaking out late at night to use up other peoples extra space (So sorry to any neighbours we might have annoyed).
We really did produce a lot of rubbish! And don't even get me started on how deeply we felt the pain when we forgot to put our bins on the curb! At one stage, we had gigantic rubbish bags so that we could stockpile landfill and recycling in our green bin and then transfer it the right bin the following week.
These days it seems like such a ridiculous situation BUT it was very real at the time! (and if you are stuck in this vicious circle of rubbish woes, I totally get it and promise there's a way out of it)
My preference is to only put out our landfill bin when full as I think one less stop for the garbage truck is a very small, but worthwhile effort. I also really want to know how long it will take to fill our bin. Lately, my partner has reverted back to cat food sachets which end up in our landfill bin and are causing a lot of grief with the ants they attract. His argument is that if there is rubbish in that bin, then it must go out and of course the smell and the ants (neither of which should be there) add weight to his point of view.
I am pretty optimistic that in the future we will have a Pay-as-you-throw system, where the cost is based on your weekly waste. This would certainly help settle our debate and also encourage others to be mindful of not only how often the bin goes out for collection, but how much is in it.
A few months ago I had a chat to a local waste expert from the council and he mentioned that using RFID technology is one way that a user pays system could be effectively monitored and managed. (I was so excited!). Each bin would have its own electronic identity and a computer on the truck would identify the bin and weight or contents for example. It seems it could be a long way off as it would involve a pretty hefty investment of time and money to implement and I can imagine a lot of people would be unhappy with it too.
What do you think, should I stick to my guns about NOT putting the bins out every week? Or do you think it is such a small action that it's a little bit pointless?
I'd love to hear your recommendations so we can come to a consensus at our house!