Louise Sallé 7:17 a.m., January 31, 2023

Every day, Europe 1 looks at an idea or a problem in your daily life.

Since January 1, 2023, the sorting instructions have changed.

All plastic packaging must now be collected in a yellow bin.

And by 2024, all food waste will also have to be sorted for composting.

Some communities, such as the Epernay conurbation, are ahead.

The great waste revolution has begun.

Since January 1, the French must sort all their plastic packaging in the yellow bin.

From 2024, this will be the case for food waste, which will have to be poured into another bin intended for industrial composting.

This is a disruption for communities, which must rethink their waste management.

Some, however, are ahead.

This is the case of the Épernay conurbation, which has been experimenting with these new regulations for four months now.

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A 40% reduction in the weight of the household waste bin 

In a waste transfer center in the Marne, in Épernay, garbage trucks parade and are emptied in the early morning.

They form a pile of household waste, made up of what the inhabitants throw in their gray bin.

Then another pile, at the other end of the shed, strewn with peelings.

And finally a third pile, made up of plastics and cardboard, from the yellow bins.

This last heap has grown considerably over the past few months, since it now contains all types of plastic packaging. 

"People have extracted from the gray bin what must now be in the yellow bin, so the weight of the gray bin has reduced on average by 40%", enthuses Martine Boutillat, vice-president of the Épernay agglomeration in responsible for waste management. 

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"The passages are no longer regular enough", laments a resident

Consequently, the household waste contained in the gray bin is now only collected once every two weeks.

What Laurie, a resident of Vertus, south of Épernay, disapproves of.

“For households of four people or more, with children, the passages are no longer regular enough,” she laments. “There is more and more waste in the streets, in the fields, etc. "

But Jérémy, a young father, welcomes the educational efforts of the community... Explanatory leaflets have been slipped into his mailbox and he is starting to get used to it.

"A question of habit and will!"

"It takes a little longer than usual to sort, to bring the bins outside, but overall it works well," he admits.

Lucien, finally, strongly supports the new system.

"It's a matter of habit and will!", he replies simply.

The inhabitants nevertheless hope that this waste management, costly for the agglomeration, will not increase their taxes.