How to Throw Out Your Garbage in Ge

How to Throw Out Your Garbage in Germany

Date: February 25, 2013Author: Ali
I know you probably didn’t think you needed an instruction manual for throwing out your garbage. Just put it in the garbage can, right? Maybe separate your glass, plastic and aluminum containers for recycling. Simple. Not so here.

Throwing out the trash is like a complicated skill in Germany, one that requires intense years of study. Or at least it seems like it should require some kind of course. Anytime someone comes to visit us, I have to give them a briefing on the trash situation in an effort to avoid total chaos and the breakdown of society. So I thought I’d share a summary of the garbage process with you. It could save your life someday.

Endless categories of garbage

On the surface, there appears to be just a few simple categories of garbage. But it doesn’t take long to realize, that’s just WRONG.

Bio – This is for food waste. So egg shells, banana peel, scraps of food you didn’t eat, that kind of thing. But I recently learned you’re also supposed to put your napkins in there too. But not used tissues. Huh?

how to throw out garbage in Germany

Paper – This is clearly for paper products. Empty cereal boxes, junk mail (although the envelope is more complicated…I’ll get to that in a minute), cardboard, and any other paper product. It’s where I used to put my napkins, because they’re paper products. They still end up in there about half the time now.

how to throw out garbage in Germany

Yellow bag – This is a plastic yellow bag, about the size of a standard kitchen garbage bag. Plastic items and other non-paper packaging materials go in here. So juice cartons, the plastic container meat comes in, plastic wrappers, yogurt containers (but only after you’ve rinsed out any remaining yogurt), and shampoo bottles. Oh, and those envelopes I mentioned? If it’s the kind that has the plastic see-through window, technically you’re supposed to separate that from the paper part of the envelope.

Black garbage can – This is the only garbage can we actually pay for. You choose your size and you’re charged accordingly. They send us a sticker each year to show that we’ve paid for it. But the odd thing is they send us the sticker in January, and it has to be on by the end of February, but the instructions specifically say not to put it on when it’s cold. January and February are pretty much always cold, so I’m not sure what the thought process is there.

how to throw out garbage in Germany

The black can is supposed to be for “other” trash, but there are so many conflicting ideas about what goes in there, it makes my head hurt. We have a German friend who says food scraps that have been cooked go in the black, but that’s not correct. Those tissues I thought should go in the bio actually go in this one. Got an old sock with a hole in it? Throw it in the black. A pan that’s starting to lose it’s protective coating? Black. Expired medications also go in here. Basically if it doesn’t quite fit in the other categories, it goes in the black.

Unless…..

Bottles and cans – Whether it’s the 2 liter Coke bottle, the smaller half liter Coke bottles, an aluminum can, or a beer bottle, they all go back to the grocery store. When you purchase something that comes in one of these containers, you pay the advertised price plus a Pfand (basically a deposit) which is listed next to the price. It ranges from 8 cents to 25 cents depending on what the item is. You have to put these bottles and cans into a machine that spits out a receipt with your refund amount. Then when you buy your groceries, the refund gets applied to your total. Or you can just hand the cashier your receipt and get your refund in cash.

how to throw out garbage in Germany

Other glass – Notice I didn’t mention wine bottles up there. They don’t have a Pfand. Wine bottles, along with any other glass jars, like pasta sauce or even a glass bottle of cough syrup, go to one of three outdoor recycling bins, sorted by color. Leave the lids on, even though my German teacher insists the lids go in the yellow bag. Also, don’t even think about walking down the street to dispose of your glass on Sundays or after the posted hours. Those are quiet hours.

how to throw out garbage in Germany

Batteries – Dead batteries go in a box next to the machine that collects the bottles.

Christmas trees – There is one specific day in January when Christmas trees are picked up. If you miss this day, well I don’t know, you might have to just keep that tree for another year.

Corks – There are a few places in town that collect the corks from wine bottles, and then they bring them somewhere else and make environmentally friendly insulation out of it.

Recycling – There’s a recycling place where you can take your dangerous items, old clothes, wood, corks, and who knows what else. Most of these items seem like they go in other categories. Plus the different recycling places in t

How to Throw Out Your Garbage in Germany

Date: February 25, 2013Author: Ali
I know you probably didn’t think you needed an instruction manual for throwing out your garbage. Just put it in the garbage can, right? Maybe separate your glass, plastic and aluminum containers for recycling. Simple. Not so here.

Throwing out the trash is like a complicated skill in Germany, one that requires intense years of study. Or at least it seems like it should require some kind of course. Anytime someone comes to visit us, I have to give them a briefing on the trash situation in an effort to avoid total chaos and the breakdown of society. So I thought I’d share a summary of the garbage process with you. It could save your life someday.

Endless categories of garbage

On the surface, there appears to be just a few simple categories of garbage. But it doesn’t take long to realize, that’s just WRONG.

Bio – This is for food waste. So egg shells, banana peel, scraps of food you didn’t eat, that kind of thing. But I recently learned you’re also supposed to put your napkins in there too. But not used tissues. Huh?