Telephones - tyres

Telephones

For unwanted British Telecom phones only, phone 0800 800 150, to order a padded jiffy bag to return your phone in.

Telephone directories (and Yellow Pages)

British Telecom will take away old directories when they deliver the new ones. If you are out when they call, take the old directories to your local library as soon as possible. Libraries will accept directories for two weeks during the delivery period. Old directories are shredded and used for packaging.

• Put Telephone Directories in Paper Banks but NOT Yellow Pages. Phone the Directory Recycling Helpline, Telephone: 0800 671 444, or check out the Yell Group website to locate your nearest recycling facilities.
• Yellow Pages can be recycled at civic amenity sites.
• Yellow Pages can also be composted by shredding, or rolling into small balls, and layering with grass, vegetable peelings, etc.
• Increasing numbers of people are giving their Yellow Pages Directories to schools for regional recycling competitions, such as the Yellow Woods Challenge.

Find out more

The Yellow Woods Challenge

• Old Yellow Pages directories can also be composted. Gently screw into a ball and add a few pages at a time. The paper adds carbon, helps to dry out the heap and creates air pockets.

Tetrapaks

Tetrapaks can now be recycled at civic amenity sites in Glasgow. Find out more about recycling TetraPaks at http://www.reuze.co.uk/juice_cartons or at ace uk.

Textiles

Keep remnants for repairs and patches, or as rags and dusters for household jobs.

Take to Textile Banks for recycling into under-felt and many other useful products. No need to remove buttons or zips (but they could go to charity shops). Locate your nearest Textile Bank at on the Sort-it website.

Most charity shops accept rags (including unsellable clothes) which they sell to raise money. See Dear Green Place Map for a list of charity shops.

Tights

Donate your old (but clean) tights and stockings (even those with holes and ladders) to the Ethiopia Tights Appeal where they will be used for women who have suffered a fistula injury due to complications in child birth, in the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital.

Following their operations the women use the panty parts of the tights to hold their bandages in place. Nothing goes to waste as the legs are woven into rugs. You can send your tights to Tightsplease who will ship them on to the hospital: Ethopia Tights Appeal, Tightsplease, 2nd floor Albion Court, 18-20 Frederick Street, Hockley, Birmingham B1 3HE.

Find out more

Tights Please - Charity

• Tights can also be used round the house for cleaning, polishing, cushion stuffing, storing rolls of wrapping paper and also in your garden (as a grow bag, as a leaf filter in your pipes, as plant ties or to store bulbs and onion).

Toys

Give to charity shops, playgroups and nursery schools. Please check that they are intact, clean and safe (no sharp metal).

Trees

(see also Christmas trees)

If you need to cut down a large tree the trunk might be useful for furniture or crafts.

Any of the following social enterprises will be interested in timber and other types of wood for their respective projects. Many of them will not uplift but may accept delivery if the tree is suitable.

Boomerang
69-73, Chapel Street
Glasgow
G20 9BD
Tel: 0141 945 6252

Boomerang makes quality furniture from recycled timber and in doing so, provides work opportunities for people suffering and recovering from mental health problems.

Bullwood Project
26 Bullwood Drive
Glasgow
G53 7NW
Tel: 0141 883 5433

The Bullwood Project takes timber and branches and transforms them into items for sale. They take commisions. Please note visit by appointment only.

Galgael Trust
15 Fairley Street
Glasgow
G51 2SN
Tel: 0141 401 8214

The Galgael Trust is a Govan-based organisation involved in training programmes (building boats out of reclaimed, good quality timber) working with green timber.

Will also accept maritime instruments, tools and boats.

The Coach House Trust
Kelvinbridge
Glasgow
G12 8EN
Tel: 0141 334 6888

The Coach House Trust provides creative and environmental training through a range of activities including recycling, composting, sustainable energy and landscape consultancy

The Glasgow Wood Recycling Project
Unit 33-34
Dalsetter Business Centre
42, Dalsetter Avenue
Glasgow
G15 8TE
Tel: 0141 944 6541

The Glasgow Wood Recycling Project offers a quality wood waste collection service and sales of reusable and recycled wood and wooden products e.g. garden planters, benches and stools.

Tyres

• Drive slowly and smoothly to reduce tyre wear.
• Don't burn tyres – they give off poisonous dioxins.
• Scrap tyres can be used for boat fenders, children’s play equipment, or stacked as soil or compost containers. Make your own compost bin out of old tyres. For more information, phone Wye Cycle on 01233 813298.
• Check whether your local garage take old tyres for recycling. Kwik Fit will take old tyres for recycling for a charge of £1.50 per tyre. To locate your nearest garage check out the Kwik-Fit website or phone: 0800 222 111.
• The Glasgow-based tyre disposal company, Anaxiom (Scotland) Ltd, will also take individuals’ old tyres for a small charge. Address: 5-47, Hawbank Rd, Glasgow, G74 5EG – Telephone: 01355 264441.

Further info on tyre recyling

It is hoped there will be a tyre pyrolysis plant in Glasgow in the future. These plants bake the tyres (rather than burn them), allowing steel and other trace elements to be recycled, without giving off poisonous dioxins.