Segregation of waste is important for businesses and households to ensure garbage is disposed of properly. It’s estimated that around one third of waste worldwide isn’t managed in an environmentally friendly way. That means millions of tons of trash end up in landfills despite recycling or recovery options being available.
Sorting waste separates materials into different streams so they should go down the appropriate processing route. This helps ensure as much trash as possible is recycled and value extracted from the materials that are reused and recovered. It also reduces the risk of exposure to potentially hazardous and dangerous waste types.
Every business should have steps in place for waste separation to help look after the environment, save your organization money, and protect human health. Learn everything you need to know about waste segregation, including the benefits and methods, with this guide.

What is waste segregation?
Waste segregation is simply the process of sorting trash materials into different categories. This involves identifying, classifying, and dividing trash types to ensure it’s disposed of properly. It’s putting garbage into different bins, containers, or dumpsters based on their type, composition, and suitable disposal or treatment method.
Sorting waste at the source or point of production is simple and effective in reducing contamination and keeping materials apart. For example, having various bins for food waste, glass recycling, and solid waste could help a restaurant segregate these materials and keep any food and glass away from landfills.
Common waste types to segregate are:
How to separate trash
Every business should separate trash at the source. The easiest way to do this is with a waste audit. Work out what different types of garbage and volumes your company creates and write down the various materials. Use the results to determine what waste types you need to separate and those you can store together.
This can depend on the amount of waste you produce and your storage space. For example, if you generate lots of glass, cardboard, and plastic packaging then using individual bins to separate trash makes sense. If you have limited space or only produce small volumes, then you could use a single stream recycling container to combine them.
These are a few tips to separate trash within your organization:
- Use different waste containers – have individual dumpsters and trash cans in place across your site to separate and store each type of waste material your business produces. This makes sorting waste at the source simple.
- Add signs and color coding – ensure all trash cans have clear signs that state the waste materials they accept. A color coding system can also work well. This should reduce instances of contamination.
- Follow clear processes – create a waste separation policy that explains the materials to segregate, what can go in specific dumpsters or trash cans, and which materials can be mixed or kept separate. Enforce the policy to minimize contamination.
- Arrange waste collections – schedule dumpster and bin collections for all the different waste streams your organization generates. This should ensure the trash is removed and disposed of responsibly based on the material.
- Train staff – explain the importance of waste segregation to employees in terms of helping the environment and saving money for the business. Run simple training sessions about what waste materials must be separated, which dumpsters they go in, and where they’re located.

Why is garbage segregation important?
Segregating garbage helps direct different waste materials towards appropriate destinations for responsible disposal. Keeping them separate limits contamination risks so as much trash as possible is kept away from landfills and value retained from the materials. It could be composting food waste, recycling glass bottles, or recovering precious metals from e-waste.
The main benefits of waste segregation are that it helps improve recycling rates and minimizes the amount of garbage sent to landfills. This reduces the carbon emissions and pollution created by landfill sites, which contribute to climate change. Separating trash types can also work out cheaper for many businesses.
These are the main benefits of waste segregation:
- Reduce contamination – separating waste materials means they can be processed in their individual streams. Contamination may mean an entire load goes to landfill or for incineration rather than recycling.
- Protect the environment – waste segregation reduces the amount of solid waste that normally gets landfilled or incinerated, which is more harmful to the environment than recycling.
- Save money – mixing trash types together may cost more as solid waste can be more expensive to dispose of than recycling streams. Splitting up materials into their individual types is often more cost-effective.
- Meet recycling targets – segregating waste ensures as much as possible is recycled. This can help your organization work towards its sustainability goals and any recycling targets set.
- Boost eco reputations – having visible waste segregation bins and recycling more can enhance your green credentials.
- Improve health and safety – safely separating hazardous and infectious waste away from daily trash like cardboard also protects the health of workers. There should be less risk of exposure to dangerous waste types across your site.
Ensure proper waste segregation
with Business Waste
At Business Waste, we can provide a wide range of dumpsters and bins to ensure proper waste segregation within your organization. These include everything from smaller 2 yard dumpsters to compactors and large roll offs. Regular collections are available on daily, weekly, or fortnightly frequencies.
All commercial trash is disposed of away from landfills in line with relevant regulations. This ensures your garbage is recycled and disposed of responsibly. Get a free quote for waste segregation bins and commercial trash collections – call 888 584 2118 or contact us online.
A waste audit is a formal process to review all the trash your business produces. It involves collecting data to measure and record the different types and volumes of waste an organization generates daily, weekly, or monthly. This information helps create an efficient and cost-effective waste management plan.
Regular waste auditing is important to review how much garbage your company produces and spends on waste management services. It’s also useful to track progress against any sustainability, recycling, or waste reduction goals. You can carry out a waste audit yourself (though it’s easier for small businesses) or enlist the help of professionals.
Discover what a waste audit is, how to conduct one, and ways to use the results of your trash audit to manage your business waste better.

What is a waste management audit?
A waste management audit (also known as a waste stream audit) is an analysis of all the items that enter your waste streams. It involves reviewing everything that goes into your dumpsters and bins before they’re collected. Professional waste management audits identify the types and quantities of trash your business produces and their disposal method.
Any organization that wants to improve its recycling, sustainability, and waste management practices starts with a waste stream audit. This provides a real-time assessment of garbage generation to identify areas where you can work to reduce waste, recycle more, and lower your waste management costs.
The standard waste management audit provides an overview of all the trash your organization produces. There are also specific audits that focus on certain waste streams, such as:
- Food waste audit – a record of all the kinds of food thrown out, where it came from, and why it’s being chucked out. This aims to determine the reasons for food waste and identify ways to reduce it.
- Recycling audit – an assessment of the current recycling streams and processes that also helps reduce the volume of solid waste. It can focus on specific recycling streams to explore ways to increase recycling rates.
- Hazardous waste audit – a review of the different types of hazardous materials disposed of by a business. It involves evaluating the storage to ensure it’s safe and that all hazardous waste is separated from other streams.
Why is a waste stream
audit important?
Waste auditing provides a good overview of all the trash your business creates. It’s a great starting point to get your business operating more sustainably by identifying ways to improve your recycling. This helps protect the environment and save your organization money in the long run.
Regular waste audits are important to track your progress and ensure your business continues to manage its trash effectively. As your company grows and the types and volumes of garbage it produces change you need to maintain this, which is where an audit helps.
These are the main benefits of a waste stream audit:
- Review the effectiveness of your current waste processes
- Identify waste types and areas for reduction
- Ensure regulatory compliance with your waste management
- Save money on dumpster rental, waste collection and disposal costs
- Increase recycling, recovery, and reuse rates for your trash

How to conduct a waste audit
You can use professionals to conduct a waste audit or carry one out for your business yourself. Good planning, wearing safe protective gear, and following a clear process helps make any waste management audit a success. The time, effort, and requirements may vary depending on the size and type of company you run.
Follow these steps to conduct a waste audit:
- Designate a team – assign a team to conduct the waste audit. This could be any health and safety experts, senior leadership, or those in environmental roles but they must be familiar with the business and its operations. Supply everyone with appropriate PPE including gloves and facemasks.
- Set a time and day(s) – decide a day and time to carry out the audit. Ideally, this should be outside of a busy or quiet period to give an idea of an average day. Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday are common days for conducting waste audits.
- Review the site – walk around your site (depending on its size) and assess the dumpsters, bins, and any other trash containers in place. This provides a good overview of your facility and where garbage is stored, which is useful to plan an efficient audit.
- Weigh the waste – sort through the different waste streams your organization produces and weigh them. This gives a good idea of the volume of trash your company produces. If you take garbage from an average day, you can multiply it to work out a rough estimate of your weekly, monthly, or annual trash production.
- Sort through trash – dive deeper into the garbage in your dumpsters and bins. Identify any items thrown into the wrong container (such as glass in a solid waste dumpster). This highlights contamination and an area to improve recycling.
- Analyze audit results – review the results to work out how much trash your business creates, and which waste streams are most common. Use this information to identify areas where you should aim to reduce waste or where you need extra recycling solutions (if there’s lots of paper in a solid waste dumpster then maybe add a paper recycling dumpster to your collections).
- Make improvements – implement any changes such as changing the sizes of the dumpsters or bins you use or adding more into your collection schedule. Keep an eye on your recycling rates and trash production and conduct another audit in the near future to track your progress.
Should you use a professional
waste auditor?
You can conduct a waste audit yourself but if you want a job done right it’s sometimes best to use a professional waste auditor. Many businesses provide expert waste audit services. These deliver great insight into the current state of your waste management processes from the types, volumes, and storage to disposal.
At Business Waste, we offer waste audit services for organizations of any size and industry. One of our experts can assess the types of trash you produce and advise on the best kinds and sizes of dumpsters you need and collection frequencies. Saving your business money and protecting the environment are at the heart of it.
Get a free no-obligation quote for a professional waste audit today – call 888 584 2118 or contact us online.