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The ProcessWaste & Recycling

Safely Disposing of Your Household Waste 

At CopperRock Recycling Centre, we’re passionate about delivering effective and efficient solutions to waste disposal that helps everyone in our community. In fact, it’s our mission to correctly recycle and dispose of your household waste.

Some products require particular care when disposing of to ensure they’re discarded safely and correctly. We ask that you please separate your waste when loading your car or trailer according to our categories; General Waste, E-Waste, Green Waste, Soils, Rubble and Recycling.

Some common sorting mistakes we see include:

Battery Disposal

When bringing your waste batteries to CopperRock, they must be separated from your waste and easily identified within your vehicle or trailer. It is against EPA Law to put batteries into hard waste, so they need to be disposed of in our dedicated bins. If batteries are thrown into the rubbish pit or our machines run over them it can cause fire, burns to our team and other harm to humans and the environment. Please ensure you remove batteries from all your E-Waste, including toys, radio’s and smoke alarms, and place them in the waste battery bins.

LPG Gas Bottle Disposal

Gas Bottles are hazardous waste and need to be placed in the designated Class 2 cages. The metal from Gas Bottles is recycled once the cylinder has been decommissioned, however, this process happens offsite in specialist centres. If Gas Bottles are placed in the steel recycling bins still containing gas, there is potential for an explosion or for the cylinder to rocket into the air causing environmental and personal harm.

E-Waste –  is banned from landfill.

Please separate from your general waste for easy identification and ensure you remove batteries from all your E-Waste, including toys, radio’s and smoke alarms, and place them in the waste battery bins.

Paint Disposal

Waste Paint thrown into the rubbish pit along with general waste contaminates everything and damages our machinery and skip bins. It also has the potential to wash down stormwater drains and contaminate our waterways causing harm to the environment. It can take hours to clean up a spill, reducing the availability of our services.

We offer an extensive paint recycling program, but it cannot operate unless the paint waste is disposed of in the designated Paintback bins.

Motor Oil Disposal

Motor oil is hazardous waste.  It needs to be disposed of in the correct manner.  Motor oil spillages are difficult to clean up and have the potential to cause harm to human health, our equipment, and the environment.  To dispose of correctly decant the oil into our bunded container and take your empty container with you.  The oil must not contain water, coolant or petrol, please refer to Detox Your Home events for safe disposal of these items.

The below hazardous items are able to be recycled at CopperRock if done so correctly. These items need to be sorted and placed in their designated bins to prevent causing harm to anyone and damage to the environment. Read our disposing of oil article to find out more.

Please ensure these items are separated from general waste and easily identified within your vehicle or trailer, and advise our staff if you have any of these items on board:

  • Batteries (lead-acid and household)
  • E-waste
  • Fluorescent Lights
  • LPG Gas Cylinders
  • Paint
  • Waste Oil

Whilst we are unable to accept the below waste, we have listed local collection services that can accept the following:

  • Asbestos chemicals
  • Cleaners, Pesticides, Fuels
    • Local councils, in conjunction with Sustainability Victoria, run regular Detox Your Home events where you can drop off household chemical waste for recycling. Commercial Businesses should utilise commercial waste removal companies.
  • Cooking Oil (unused) –
  • Cooking Oil (used) –
    • Can be dropped off at Monash Transfer Station.  This oil is then recycled into biofuel and other bi-products. Do not pour your used cooking oil down your drains.
  • Liquid waste
  • Medicine waste
    • Return Med – Accepts your unused or unwanted medicines, or all pharmacies are equipped to accept all medicines for disposal too.
  • Pressurised containers (including adhesives, spray paints, helium gases and fire extinguishers)
    • Empty aerosol cans can be put in your recycling bin. If the aerosol can isn’t empty, it can be disposed of through your council’s Local Detox Your Home events.
  • Crusher dust, sawdust or any waste in powder form
    • Sawdust can be disposed of in your green bin along with your garden waste to be turned into compost and then used in parks, gardens and farms to improve soil. Other powder waste consider a Detox Your Home event
  • Clay or large landscape rock/boulders – try giving away your landscape rocks by advertising in community social media groups.
  • Tree trunks or tree limbs with a diameter greater than 30cm.
    • Large tree limbs should be cut down smaller than 30cm to be accepted.
  • Solar Panels – Recycling this waste will prevent harm to the environment and human health, and save valuable resources for future use.
    • Ewastec – can accept solar panels for a fee.

Learn more about our Do’s and Don’ts of recycling with CopperRock here.

Please always remember our site rules

  • Sort your waste prior to attending the Centre.
  • All visitors to enter site via the weighbridge
  • Correct footwear– No thongs and sandals
  • Children and Pets must remain in vehicle
  • Speed limit is 10km / hour
  • Watch out for forklift and other machinery
  • Do not walk around the site, disembark your vehicle at the designated areas.
  • Only bring to the Centre waste that is being disposed of at the Centre –
  • for example:
    • Do not bring polystyrene with your cardboard if you do not plan to pay for disposal of the polystyrene.
    • Do not bring bags of items for the Opportunity Shop – go to the Opp. Shop first.
    • Do not bring new materials such as timber and recycled timber you wish to keep, with your waste timber for disposal.