The City of Karratha’s 2026 bin tagging program is complete and has given a clearer picture of household recycling habits and where there’s room to improve.
The education initiative ran from 1 July to 11 August to understand household sorting behaviours, identified common recycling contamination issues and provide practical feedback to residents.
As part of the initiative, recycling and general waste bins at selected households were visually inspected before collection, with educational tags used to provide residents with feedback about their waste sorting.
The program found around three in four recycling bins inspected contained at least one contaminant, with soft plastics, unrinsed containers and recyclables placed in bags. Recyclables were also found in more than one-third of inspected general waste bins.
The audit also highlighted a possible capacity issue at some properties, with 17.3 per cent of the 2,278 recycling-bin inspections found a full or overfull recycling bin while recyclables were also found in general waste.
City of Karratha Mayor Daniel Scott said the bin tagging program had established a baseline that will help guide future waste education.
“The program gives us a much clearer picture of what is going into household recycling bins and, importantly, where residents may need more information or support,” Mayor Scott said.
“The most common issues were plastic bags and packaging, unrinsed containers and recyclables placed inside bags.
“These results will now be used to help us improve recycling education and review potential service barriers, including whether recycling bin capacity is meeting the needs of households.
“Getting recycling right helps reduce the amount of waste going to landfill and ensures more materials can be recovered and reused, so it’s important we use what we’ve learned through this program to make it easier for residents to do the right thing.”
For more information visit: https://karratha.wa.gov.au/environment/waste-and-recycling/bin-tagging-education