A new recycling plan throughout Tower Hamlets is resulting in less rubbish at Whitechapel Market. The new scheme is allowing market traders to divide their waste into organic matter -- think produce and the less tasty bits of animals -- and dry recyclables such as plastics and cardboard. Rubbish is collected twice daily, and the massive bins used will be fitted with locks to prevent cross-contamination by well-meaning passersby. The new scheme projects that......

Wheelie bin crisis? Blame the French. That's what Lewisham is doing, claiming that a fire in France is responsible for a severe worldwide shortage that has also blighted local homeowners. Councillors in the southeast London borough have hit upon an ingenious solution - they're asking people to suck up a little of that wartime spirit and share their bins with the neighbours. Never mind that most folk in London could barely pick their neighbours......

In order to arrive at its current policy of green box and brown box recycling collections alongside normal rubbish, Islington Council had to do its homework and weigh the options. What more sensible way of doing this than sifting through samples of household rubbish to ascertain what folks were actually chucking out and take it from there? Unfortunately, the prevalent paranoia about identity theft and (understandable) fear of civil liberties being eroded means that......

The all-new, caring, sharing, environmentally sound Tory party wants us to live with the same spirit as their very own bumptious leader, all biking to work and wind turbines and eco-harmony. To that end they've announced households could be paid for recycling their rubbish under a Conservative government. Rightfully castigating Labour's predictably stentorian plan to fine non-recyclers, the Tories have been inspired by a US scheme in which households are paid $50 a month......

Pity the poor residents of Southgate Road, N1. With half the street in Islington, the other bound to Hackney how are they meant to know if they're coming or going, let alone which day what rubbish collection is? For it seems that living here is very complicated if you're keen to separate your waste and use council recycling services. Friends of the Earth have condemned Southgate Road as "the most confusing in the country......

A small Camden charity, Hare Krishna Food for All, was named Novelis Community Recycing Project of the year at The Resource Awards last week. We hadn't heard of them before today but nosing around their website we're really rather in awe of their humanitarian and environmental efforts in central London. It's a really simple idea. Food For All provides disadvantaged people with free hot meals in Camden, Kings Cross and Holborn, by collecting food......

Love London is a "green-up" festival packed with 3 weeks of "eco-events'. We mentioned the Green Tours last week but there's much much more going on, starting with the Recycled Sculpture Show at ZSL which hosted the launch of the festival last Thursday. Previously lumbered with the title "London Sustainability Weeks", Love London's snappier current form covers events as diverse as naked bike riding, fair trade tea dancing, a locally sourced, midsummer feast in......

Just a week after we were all taken aback that work on the Olympic stadium had begun ahead of schedule, its fate is being discussed with potential hosts of the next Games and the idea mooted to recycle its seats for reuse in 2016. It was always planned for the sunken cupcake to have a certain number of permanent seats with extra capacity retained only for the period of the Games. Discussions with Chicago,......

Like a rock band without the rock, the Top Gear Three are going on an international tour. Sorry, let me just re-read that…. Whole swathes of the East End are being rather cleverly recycled into pretty and useful areas for 2012. Yup: this is a positive Olympics story. Yahoo says Yah Boo to London: they’re moving to Switzerland. Something to do with tax, we hear. Two rather dim youths have been arrested for trying......

When you're picking up your freesheet on the way home tonight don't just leave it on the train for some other, poor, reading material starved sucker. Turn it into public art! No, we don't mean have an art attack on the platform and start making saucy hats or paper planes (although both are better uses for these "newspapers" than reading them). We mean, go to Gillett Square in Dalston and help build the Newspaper......

Are you an unreconstructed, consumerist, couch potato with no social conscience? Excellent. Read on. Because the Rubbish Game wants you. We went to the Rubbish Game this week and, if only we hadn't got distracted drinking wine, we might have won it. Through 3 punishing rounds of stuff distribution we managed to zero our waste, creatively and cunningly disposing of it through righteous means. We dabbled in the recycling fair to win recycling tokens......

What stops you recycling? Are you lazy? Don't know where to start? Does your rubbish overwhelm you? The Rubbish Game wants to know. Then it wants to turn your rubbish around, with the help of the Binman of Love. It could get filthy. The Rubbish Game takes place on Wednesday 16 January at the Dana Centre at the Science Museum. It sounds a bit like Hungamunga crossed with the Krypton Factor and wrapped in......

We don't just mean bring out the same old decorations next year and put that box of bath salts away to give to your ageing aunty as you'll be vastly allergic to them. We mean don't let Christmas excess go to waste. Recycle your poor old Christmas tree, garish Christmas cards, hastily torn apart wrapping paper and as much of your larger than usual household waste (could anyone else start a bottle band with......

Every day this month the Londonist team will be pointing you in the direction of a Christmas present that (with a bit of luck) you won't already have on your list. Climb up onto our collective lap and we'll see what we can move from our sack to your stockings... Make Lounge is one of those ideas that is so great, you'll wish you thought of it yourself. When journalist and Make Lounge founder......

Almost everyone who owns a mobile phone has either accidentally or very deliberately thrown their contraption across great distances - and if you haven't managed to do something destructive to your telecommunications gadget, then you're not using it properly. The urge to hurl is so potent, the throwing of phones has now been turned into a sporting event: the first mobile throwing championships took place in Finland at the turn of the millennium and......