We have this set up on each side of our L shaped island. One trash and one recycle bin in each pull out drawer. One of my favorite things! So convenient.

It's very convenient. But if daily emptying of trash daily has become a big deal....... makes me wonder what the bed making thing looks like : )

Lots of stuff is not really trash or re -cycle. It's garbage. Frankly? Garbage usually acquires a stink in short order. As part of daily tidying, I find the consolidation of ALL trash, recycle and garbage, from every room to the exterior of home, makes any home a lot more inviting.

Buy a blue can for the recycling can, and consider using a label maker to make a "recycling" label on the top edge of three cabinet drawer (si its visible when the drawer is pulled out, but not when it's closed). It will be obvious to your family which is garbage and which is recycling but guests will not know and will mess up.

I have one pull out trash/recycling cabinet. We try to recycle everything and cut down on the amount of trash we make. I do rinse things and veggie or fruit left overs get tossed in the woods for compost/wildlife. I think not seeing a trash can in the kitchen is nice and I have never had a problem with smell. I would worry about the build up of nasty with 2 trash sections if you are not emptying because there is still room to jam more in. If I had two, I would have one be all recycling and the other dirty trash in the front, cleaner (non stinky) trash in the back and still empty often. Hope that helps

I have back to back sinks in my island with a trash pull out bin on each side and a recycle bin behind it. They are from Ikea and I find the garbage bins just the right size to change out every day.We have larger recycle bins in the laundry room that the small ones gets sorted into and then once a week I stop at recycling on my way out to my horse. Bottles and cans we save in a large outside cabinet and donate to whoever is collecting them at the time. It sounds complicated but really easy . I have a small compost bucket under the prep sink that just gets dumped in the compost when I take out the garbage.In a whole week I probably have about 2 lbs of actual garbage.I will tell you disposals should be illegal everywhere there is no reason to not have composting site or bins , the disposals have been illegal in Europe for years maybe time we start caring a little more about our environment too.

You would need 2 trash cans in each!

My recycling tends to be really bulky too.

In reality, the only products worth recycling in most areas are aluminum cans, copper and vegie scraps/compost for the garden. Paper and plastic costs about 3 times as much to recycle as it costs to put it in a landfill in large part because of the energy required to do so. Sorting costs add up too. Glass recycling breaks even at best. City administrations know this, but recycling is a feel-good, vote getting, virtue-signalling practice which is unlikely to go away anytime soon. So don't feel too bad if the division between the regular trash and recycling isn't so formalized.

you could even cut down on trash more if you composted :) Bonus for a fun learning tool for the kids (plus worms - what kid doesn't love worms?)

One question I have about the economics/ecology of recycling is how much water people use rinsing out containers before recycling them. It really strikes me that people seem to accept the desirability of recycling without question, while at the same time restrictions are imposed on the water consumption of all kinds of new appliances.

I have news for you. Most people are not KIND enough to rinse. That I know, I see that in client garages almost weekly and the go with STINK.

Unless you want to take yourself totally off the grid, some effects of humanity, and the accompanying consumption are inevitable. Worry about the diapers in the landfills instead.

Most of the entire recycling program is nothing but a tax. DRIVE one of these huge trucks around for a day picking up this stuff, on separate days, and with a separate truck . ...? lol.

The diapers have been one of my pet peeves for ever. We had no dryer and i washed diapers for 3 kids over the span of 5 yrs. worked full time and still managed to take out the garbage daily too. IMO the most important recycling is glass, plastics and aluminum get a composter for the scraps you send down the disposal. The paper will will decompose in the landfill and your dryer lint can go in the compost.

@bluedot16 I feel like everyone who knows me would be like "oh god no don't get him started!" but - I'm up against a hard deadline. Just a couple quick things to know:

• if you do EVERYTHING wrong, your scraps still decompose
• there's a great book on the subject called Let It Rot, that explains everything in simple terms and gets you up and running immediately
• if you love Bill Nye levels of science, there's also a book called Teaming With Microbes that goes more in depth in the processes
• your local county extension office should have pamphlets and fact sheets on composting, as well as other gardening and landscape topics. They're a FREE resource that's funded by your state's land grant university so definitely use that resource!
• if you have random questions, feel free to post on my Facebook page and I'll answer what I can, as I can. I love my compost pet so I'm happy to geek out and answer your questions.

hope that helps!