Soft Plastic Recycling Trial

Phase one of the trial was highly successful, with high-quality soft plastics collected that were suitable for recycling. Feedback from participating households was positive, with many appreciating the ‘bag in bin’ service, describing it as easy to understand and convenient to use. Learn more about the phase 1 trial outcomes here.

With the initial trial now complete, we are transitioning into a new pilot phase.

Common soft plastic packaging includes bags for chips, cereal and sweets, soft packaging from fresh and frozen foods, bubble wrap and cling wrap.

Please make sure your plastic is dry and as empty as possible before placing in your coloured bag.

• Biscuit packets (outer wrapper only)
• Bread bags (without the tie)
• Bubble wrap (large sheets cut into A3 size pieces)
• Cat and dog food pouches (as clean and dry as possible)
• Cellophane from bunches of flowers (cut into A3 size pieces)
• Cereal box liners
• Chip and cracker packets (silver lined)
• Chocolate and snack bar wrappers
• Cling film - GLAD, COLES HOME brand and WOOLWORTHS Essentials Home brand ONLY
• Confectionery bags
• Document sleeves (remove the white reinforcement strip along the holes)
• Dry pet food bags
• Fresh produce bags
• Frozen food bags
• Green bags (woven polypropylene bags)
• Ice cream wrappers
• Large sheets of plastic that furniture comes wrapped in (cut into A3 size pieces)
• Meat - plastic packaging that has contained meat (rinse and dry first)
• Netting produce bags (any metal clips removed)
• Newspaper and magazine wrap
• Pasta bags
• Pet food bags (chaff/horse/chicken) - both the plastic and woven polypropylene types (but not woven nylon). Cut into A3 size pieces and shake free of as much product as possible
• Plastic Australia Post satchels
• Plastic carrier bags from all stores
• Plastic film wrap from grocery items such as nappies and toilet paper
• Plastic sachets
• Potting mix and compost bags - both the plastic and woven polypropylene types (cut into A3 size pieces and free of as much product as possible)
• Rice bags - both plastic and the woven type (if large, cut into A3 size pieces)
• Snap lock bags / zip lock bags
• Squeeze pouches with lid on (e.g. yogurt/baby food)
• Wine/water bladders (hard plastic spout removed)

Please do not put the following materials in your coloured bag:

• ‘Hard or rigid’ plastic containers/packaging. Please place these items loosely in your yellow lid recycled bin for recycling.
• Lids, bread tags or balloons. These items go in your blue or red lid landfill bin.
• Compostable plastics. Your green organics bin is the best place for these to ensure they can be recycled.
• Degradable plastics. Please place these in your blue or red lid landfill bin.
• Dirty soft plastics. Soft plastics that are dirty need to go in the landfill bin as they cannot be recycled if not clean.

For more information you can view the Soft Plastics Trial Fact Sheet.

Soft plastics appear with all sorts of products and most of it ends up in landfill. This pilot is testing ways in which post-consumer soft plastics can be collected and recycled through your kerbside recycling bin. This provides a 'second chance' for soft plastics, which are long-lived materials that are suitable to be recycled again and again.

To build a truly circular economy for soft plastics, we need to make it easy for people to recycle soft plastics after use and support the development of a new, advanced recycling industry for soft plastics here in Australia. As it develops, that industry will increase its capacity to take post-consumer soft plastic and turn it back into new packaging, ready for reuse.

It is also important to reduce your use of soft plastics, where practical alternatives exist. While not all soft plastics can be readily avoided, always ask yourself the question "Do I need this?" before making a purchase.

Thanks to the AFGC, the Central Adelaide Waste and Recycling Authority and the soft plastic recycling industry, this pilot program is available at no cost to participating households.

Soft plastic packaging includes the "scrunchable” plastic bags and wrappers that food, grocery and other products come in. The most common items are bread bags, breakfast cereal bags, frozen vegetable bags, ice cream wrappers, confectionery bags, cling wrap, bubble wrap and plastic wrapping from toilet paper.

Your orange bags (filled with recyclable soft plastics) will be sorted at the Central Adelaide Waste and Recycling Authority recycling centre. They will then be sent to a plastics processor for shredding, further sorting (by plastic type) and to be made into new plastic products.

This process helps reduce the need for virgin plastics, minimises waste sent to landfills for disposal, lowers emissions and cuts down on litter.

We need soft plastics to be collected in a dedicated bag because loose soft plastics can jam up recycling machinery in trucks and at recycling facilities. The orange trial bags have been provided specifically to be the right strength, easy to identify and easy to sort when filled and sealed correctly. It’s very important to keep all other recyclable items in your yellow-lidded recycling bin loose, as you normally would.

Enclosed with this pack you received is 20 bags. If you run out of them before the end of the 12-month trial period, please contact us on 8408 1111 to organise additional bags so that you can continue to be part of the trial.

Loose soft plastics and bagged recyclable items can get tangled in recycling machinery, which is why we always ask our residents to not bag recyclable items normally.

The orange pilot bags are designed for easy identification. When filled and sealed correctly, the bags can be easily separated from other recyclable items and will not get caught in the machinery.

It’s very important to keep all other items in your yellow lidded recycling bin loose (not bagged) as you usually do.

This trial is not connected to the REDcycle store drop-off scheme and is not affected by the announcement that REDcycle has temporarily paused its scheme from 9 November 2022. The council trial will continue uninterrupted.