“What is your recycling rate?” used to be a question for corporates with sustainability departments. Now it turns up in tender pre-qualification questionnaires, supplier onboarding forms and ESG surveys sent to businesses of every size — and “we don’t measure it” is increasingly a scored answer, not a neutral one. The good news: the calculation itself is simple. The work is in getting the data.

Here’s the formula, where the numbers come from, what a “good” rate looks like, and how to turn yours into a commercial asset.

The Formula

At its simplest:

Recycling rate (%) = weight of waste recycled ÷ total weight of waste produced × 100

So a business producing 10 tonnes of waste a year, of which 6.5 tonnes goes to recycling, has a 65% recycling rate.

Two related figures often asked for alongside it:

• Landfill diversion rate: everything not landfilled (recycling + composting/AD + energy recovery) as a percentage of total waste. Always higher than your recycling rate, since energy-from-waste counts.
• Recovery rate: sometimes used interchangeably with diversion; check what a questionnaire actually means before answering.

Be precise about which you’re quoting. A 95% diversion rate presented as a 95% recycling rate is the kind of slip that unravels under audit — and overstated green claims now carry regulatory risk of their own.

Where the Numbers Come From

This is where most businesses hit the wall: the formula needs weights, and most SMEs only know how many bins they have.

Best source: your waste contractor’s reports. Collections are weighed (or assigned standard weights per container), and any decent provider can report tonnages by stream — general waste, dry mixed recycling, food, glass, card — monthly or quarterly. If your contractor can’t or won’t provide tonnage data, that tells you something about the contractor. A waste reporting service does exactly this job: every stream, every collection, one consolidated dataset.

If you only have volumes: convert using standard density figures — e.g. a 1,100-litre bin of general waste is typically counted around 90–100kg when full; dry mixed recycling around 50–60kg; food waste far heavier per litre. Conversions are cruder than weighbridge data but defensible if you state the method.

Don’t forget the irregular streams. Skips from refits, hazardous collections, WEEE, confidential waste and scrap metal all count in the total — and scrap and cardboard rebate streams are recycling you may be forgetting to claim credit for. A clear-out skip’s contents are typically sorted at the transfer station; ask your provider for the recycling percentage achieved on the load.

Count everything or state your boundary. If your figure covers your main site only, or excludes construction projects, say so. A smaller honest number beats a bigger fuzzy one.

Worked Example

A café-deli over 12 months:

• Recycling + composting rate: (3.1 + 1.8 + 2.6 + 1.5) ÷ 13.2 = 68%
• If the general waste goes to energy-from-waste rather than landfill: landfill diversion ≈ 100%

Both are strong, quotable numbers — and the gap between them shows exactly where improvement lives: the 4.2 tonnes of general waste.

What’s a “Good” Rate?

Context matters — a metal fabricator and a nail salon have different ceilings — but as rough UK benchmarks:

• Below 40% — behind the pack; usually means recyclables are going in general waste
• 50–65% — around typical for SMEs making a reasonable effort; roughly where UK commercial performance sits
• 70%+ — genuinely good, and a credible tender answer
• 85%+ — excellent; usually requires food waste capture, good segregation and engaged staff

The trajectory matters as much as the number. “58%, up from 41% last year, targeting 70%” is a better answer than a static 65% — it shows measurement and management.

Why Clients Ask — And What They Do With Your Answer

• Scope 3 emissions. Large companies must report supply-chain emissions, and your waste is part of their footprint. Suppliers who can’t provide data create a reporting gap they’d rather avoid.
• Tender scoring. Public sector and corporate procurement commonly scores environmental questions at 5–10% of the total — enough to decide close contests.
• Risk screening. A business that can’t evidence waste compliance is flagged as a Duty of Care risk.
• Their own marketing. Your numbers feed their sustainability claims; evidenced suppliers are simply easier to keep.

The commercial upside runs the other way too: a solid, evidenced rate is a differentiator against competitors who answer “N/A” — and once you’re measuring, the same data usually reveals cost savings, since general waste is your most expensive stream per tonne.

Improving the Number

The gap analysis writes itself once you have stream data. In rough order of impact:

1. Get food waste out of general waste — it’s heavy, so it moves the tonnage numbers fast (and it’s now a legal requirement for most businesses anyway)
2. Fix contamination — labelled bins, pictures, staff briefings; one contaminated load can void a month of good recycling
3. Capture cardboard properly — flattened, dry, separate
4. Add missing streams — glass, film, wood, metal, depending on your sector
5. Route residual waste to energy recovery — doesn’t change your recycling rate, but takes your diversion rate towards 100%

Make It Automatic

None of this should be a spreadsheet job you dread each quarter. Select A Skip’s waste reporting service tracks tonnages and destinations across every stream we collect — regular commercial collections, skips and hazardous streams alike — so your recycling and diversion rates are a report away whenever a tender, auditor or customer asks. One provider, one dataset, defensible numbers.

Get in touch for a no-obligation quote — we reply the same working day.