Food tins and drinks cans
Guidance
Alias
food and drinks cans
Food tins and drink cans can be recycled at home. Please just give them a quick rinse to make sure there is no food residue. You can leave the label on but do not crush or flatten.
Items that can be recycled
- Drinks cans
- Food tins, ideally with its lid attached and no need to remove the label
- Empty aerosols (please remove plastic caps)
- Jar lids
- Clean foil and foil trays
Items that cannot be recycled
- General kitchenware e.g. cutlery, pots and pans
- Crisp and sweet packets/wrappers (some manufacturers, such as Walkers, offer a free recycling scheme. TerraCycle (opens in a new window) has a number of drop-off points where crisp packets and biscuit wrappers can be recycled).
- Laminated plastic food/drink pouches e.g. baby food, cat food, or coffee pouches, but some of these can be recycled through TerraCycle (opens in a new window)
- Metal containers for chemicals e.g. white spirits, paints, or engine oils, but empty paint paint containers can be recycled at your local reuse and recycling centre (opens in a new window)
- Any other metal items e.g. kettles, irons, pipes, white goods (visit our electrical and electronic items page (opens in a new window) to find out how to recycle electrical items. Metal pipes and wire coat hangers can be recycled at your local reuse and recycling centre (opens in a new window)