Weekly food waste collections to start this autumn

Weekly food waste collections could start to be introduced from as soon as September this year.

In Brighton & Hove, around a third of household rubbish is food and drink waste – that's about 2.8kg per household each week.

Increasing recycling is a priority for the council, which is why we’re investing £1.2 million in a new weekly food waste service so all households, whether in a kerbside or communal area, will be able to recycle their food waste.

At May’s Cabinet, councillors agreed to the phased implementation of food waste across the city. Rollout is expected to start from September 2025 and it will be made available for all households by March 2026.

Councillor Tim Rowkins, Cabinet member for Net Zero and Environmental Services, said: “Food and drink waste makes up around a third of household rubbish and around 75% of that is avoidable, so getting that out of the waste system is a no brainer.

“We know residents want food waste collections, that’s why we’re investing £1.2 million to fund the service.

“Cabinet’s decision means we can now move forward and introduce it as soon as possible.

“The food waste will be combined with our garden waste and turned into compost for use in and around the city.”

Proposed introduction of food waste collections

Each phase of the rollout of the new service will inform the next, so the dates may be subject to change, but the indicative timeline is.

• From September 2025 – around 11,000 households in the east of city
• October 2025 – around 29,000 households in the north of city
• November 2025 – around 31,000 households in the west of city
• By March 2026 – the remaining 76,000 households in central and communal areas

Expanding our mixed recycling offer soon

Ahead of the introduction of food waste collections, the council will soon be collecting plastic pots, tubs and trays – such as yoghurt pots, fruit trays/punnets, margarine tubs, and soup pots - as part of the mixed recycling collections. This will be expanded to also include food and drink cartons, as well as aluminium foil and foil trays.

Trials have been taking place to test the new sorting process, and the council will update residents on the timeline for these new materials shortly.

How the food waste service will work

When introduced, all households will be provided with a 5-litre kitchen caddy and a year’s supply of compostable liners. Those in kerbside areas will receive a 23-litre outside food waste bin, while in communal areas specialist secure food waste bins will be installed that will be emptied every day.

Using the new bins is easy: residents simply empty any food waste they have, such as plate scrapings, peelings and tea bags into their caddy. When full, they empty it into an outside food waste bin. Kerbside collections will be weekly, and communal collections daily.

Once collected, the food waste will be processed and turned into compost near Lewes at the same facility as our garden waste.

Until the new service is operational, please continue to put your food waste in with your regular waste, so you don’t contaminate the recycling and have it end up going to waste. Alternatively, you may choose to use a separate community composting scheme such as the one run by the Brighton & Hove Food Partnership.

Find out what items can and cannot be recycled in Brighton & Hove and where to recycle them.

Read the full Cabinet report.