Residents can recycle accepted items through the City of Winnipeg’s residential curbside cart or bin collection service, at a community recycling depot or a 4R Winnipeg Depot.
After your recyclables get picked up from your cart, bin, or a drop off depot, they get delivered to our Materials Recovery Facility (MRF). GFL Environmental Inc. owns the MRF.
The MRF uses machines to sort a majority of the items it receives, while employees complete about 10 percent of the sorting work.
It is important for residents to know what you can and cannot recycle. Keeping not accepted items out of your recycling helps:
- Prevent damage to the machines
- Keep the employees working at the MRF safe
- Increase the value of the sorted recyclables
The simplest way to find out if an item is recyclable or not is to check what goes where using Recyclepedia. It helps you find out which household items are recyclable by typing in whatever household object you are looking to recycle. Recyclepedia will tell you if it can be recycled in your blue cart, bin or at a 4R Winnipeg Depot and/or how to dispose of it safely.
After being sorted at the MRF, we sell the sorted recyclables to brokers that work with companies to turn the items into new products. Here are some examples of what happens to your recyclables:
Glass is recycled and turned into road base.
Plastic products are be recycled into:
- Plastic bottles
- Plastic trays
- Carpet fibre
- Sewage pipes
- Plastic lumber
Milk and juice cartons are recycled and turned into paper.
Aluminum and steel cans are recycled into:
- Auto parts
- Aluminum cans
- Steel building products
Paper and cardboard products are recycled into:
- Newspaper
- Household paper
- Cardboard
- Egg cartons