Aerosol sprays to be recycled with food and drink cans in Somerset to recover metal

They deliver everything from deodorant to insecticide, hair spray to paint, with each household getting through 27 a year on average.

And until this week the vast majority of the 6.5 million aerosols used every year in Somerset were ending up in the refuse bin and heading for landfill.

But from now on aerosols can be added to the food and drink cans in your kerbside recycling box to recover their steel and aluminium, saving significant levels of energy as they are turned into anything from a car part to a window frame or back into an aerosol.

With their caps and nozzles removed, aerosols are ideal for recycling since their raw metals can be used again endlessly without losing quality.

Recycling a ton of steel aerosols saves 1.5 tonnes of iron ore and cuts carbon dioxide emissions, while recycling the same weight of aluminium spray cans saves four tonnes of bauxite, the raw material from which aluminium is made, and prevents nine tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.

Just as the range of materials taken by recycling sites has been growing – cooking oil was the latest addition at all 18 locations – so aerosols are just one of three new items being taken at the kerbside to make it easier for residents to recycle more and let less waste go to costly landfill.

Clothes and shoes have always been taken in kerbside collections but now other textiles can also be set out for collection, while paper kitchen towel can be added to food waste.

As with all materials for recycling, there are a few simple steps to ensure everything can be collected and immediately put to good use.

Use up your aerosols so they are empty and include them with your food and drink cans, but do not pierce or crush them. It helps to discard nozzles and tops into your refuse bin or black sacks. All aerosols can be recycled but gas canisters, such as those containing camping gas or used in home fizzy drinks machines, are not accepted. Aerosols can also be taken to all recycling sites.

While stuffed items, such as duvets, pillows and quilts, cannot be taken, a wide range of textiles, such as curtains, covers, blankets, sheets and towels, can be put out for kerbside collection as well as clothes. Keep them dry in plastic bags – not black sacks – and label them: "Textiles." All recycling sites accept textiles.

Adding paper kitchen towel to food waste in your kerbside lockable container will mean it can be transformed into compost or, from next year, become electricity through Somerset's new anaerobic digester plant. Food waste with or without kitchen towel can be taken to recycling sites but only for disposal.

The addition of aerosols to kerbside collections has won praise from the Aluminium Packaging Recycling Organisation (Alupro), whose executive director, Rick Hindley, said that Somerset "is setting a shining example" by enabling local households to recycle aerosols alongside such items as aluminium foil and food and drink cans, as this will "save even more valuable energy and resources".