Three weekly waste collections

Following an extensive public consultation in 2024, the majority of households in North Somerset now receive a weekly recycling collection and a black bin collection every three weeks. Search for your next collection dates

You can also now recycle plastic bags and soft plastic packaging at kerbside. Download our leaflet on soft plastics to find out more.

The move to three-weekly black bin collections is in line with our Recycling and Waste strategy, which aims to reduce non-recycled waste and reach a recycling rate of 70 per cent by 2030. These changes will significantly reduce the costs associated with collecting and treating waste in North Somerset and generate savings of over £1 million to help fund vital local services.

Collection vehicles

New collection vehicles are being introduced during summer 2025. The vehicles have larger compartments for collecting batteries, clothes, small electrical items and vapes to make these collections more reliable. They also have a dedicated compartment for plastic bags and soft plastic wrapping.

While we wait for all the new vehicles to come into service, some plastic bags and soft plastic wrapping will be collected by vans separately to the recycling vehicle.

Plastic bags and soft plastic wrapping

We are the first local authority in the country to offer a kerbside collection for plastic bags and soft plastic wrapping  across the whole of the district. 

Soft plastic items such as food wrappers, film lids, plastic bags and crisp packets can be recycled by stuffing them into any soft plastic bag such as a carrier bag or bread bag, then tying the top and placing in your recycling box with glass bottles and jars. 

For more information on recycling plastic bags and soft plastic wrapping, please see our leaflet on soft plastics.

App

We've also introduced a free North Somerset Council app to make recycling and waste collections easier. You can set up reminders for when to put out your bins and receive real-time information about the service if a collection can't be made. You can also check what to do with different items, as well as find out about other council services.

Download from the Apple app store or Google Play Store for Android phone users.

We introduced weekly kerbside recycling collections of a wide range of materials, including food waste, 15 years ago. However, an analysis of the waste North Somerset households put in their black bins found that almost half (45 per cent) could have been recycled.

Of the total waste put in black bins, over a quarter (27 per cent) was food waste and almost half of this was unopened food still in its packaging.

In 2023, households in North Somerset generated approximately 90,000 tonnes of waste, 40,000 tonnes of which was put in black bins. 18,000 tonnes of this could have been recycled instead, saving money and protecting the environment.

Black bin rubbish costs £130 per tonne to dispose of and this year we will need to spend about £5 million on processing this waste. In contrast, our separated kerbside recycling collections result in a high quality of material that can be sold and made into new materials and generates an income of around £30 per tonne.

You can find answers to the full list of frequently asked questions about three-weekly collections below.