A waste container is a container for temporarily storing waste, and is usually made out of metal or plastic. Common terms are dustbin, rubbish bin, litter bin, garbage can, trash can, trash bin, dumpster, waste basket, waste paper basket, waste receptacle, container bin, bin, kitchen bin, trash barrel, and rubbish barrel. The words “rubbish”, “basket” and “bin” are more common in British English usage; “trash” and “can” are more common in American English usage.
Curbside dustbins
The curbside dustbins usually consist of three types: trash cans (receptacles often made of tin, steel or plastic), Dumpsters (large receptacles similar to skips) and wheelie bins (light, usually plastic bins that are mobile). All of these are emptied by collectors, who will load the contents into a garbage truck and drive it to a landfill, incinerator or consuming crush facility to be disposed of. The standard sized UK wheelie bin household collection is 240 litres.
In some areas there is also a recycling service, often with one or more dedicated bins intended to receive items that can be recycled into new products. These bins are sometimes separated into different categories (usually represented by colours) which determine what materials can be inserted into the bin. The contents of the bins are taken to a recycling plant to be processed, and there are various systems for recycling bin collection: single bin combined stream systems, multiple bin systems, and cyclic collections with different materials collected on different days.
Bins in public areas
Certain public areas such as parks have litter bins which are placed alongside paths frequently walked by visitors. This encourages people to avoid littering, which creates an unhealthy and aesthetically unpleasant social environment.
Bins in outdoor locations or other busy public areas are usually mounted to the ground or wall. This discourages theft, and also reduces vandalism by making it harder for someone to physically move or maneuver the bins; to spill their contents on the ground for example, or to use the bin as an effective weapon to hit people over the back with.
In the past terrorists have left improvised explosive devices in bins. The bomb is much less likely to be spotted than an unattended bag and the metal bins provide extra shrapnel that injures people nearby when it detonates. For this reason there are no bins in most railway stations, most airports, and many shopping centres in the United Kingdom, or if they are provided they are just a bin bag hanging from a metal loop.
A Danish design company called Peoples ApS, have in cooperation with Swedish based Dynasafe AB, developed a “bombproof” bin suitable for public places. The bins were successfully tested at Saab Bofors test center, an independent third party, using the maximum amount of explosives specified for the particular design.
Garbage bin attatched to wall at a school.
Apartment buildings often have two dust flumes in which residents can dispose of their trash in stainless steel trash cans. These chutes usually lead to some large receptacle or complex in the basement
