Communal food bin cleaning trial

The communal food bin cleaning trial took place last year (2023) from April until November in five District and Borough’s – Woking, Elmbridge, Mole Valley, Epsom & Ewell and Reigate and Banstead.

Cleaning of the bins took place at a variety of frequencies to determine if there was an optimum for improving how clean the bins stayed for a significant period of time and how much residents used the bin as a result. A total 65 blocks of flats were included in the study and 79 bin cleanings took place.

Overall the results showed that cleaning the flats food bins, at a frequency which might be practical, would not keep food bins clean for very long and ultimately did not increase the amount that residents used the food waste service.