On Thursday, February 1, 2018, the Town of Portsmouth converted its Transfer Station residential waste drop-off program to a new pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) waste reduction program.  With this program, residential trash is only accepted when residents place it in official Portsmouth PAYT bags.

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Why make this change?  For many very good reasons.

• Residents can save money. With the new, more equitable PAYT program, residents pay only for the garbage they throw away—not for their neighbors’ trash too!

• Portsmouth saves. If there’s less trash generated, Portsmouth pays less to manage it.  These savings—which can be substantial—can be rerouted back into the community.

• The environment is better preserved: When residents throw away less, recycle more, and “lighten the load” in any number of other ways, landfills last longer, greenhouse gas emissions are reduced, millions of BTUs of energy are saved, and natural resources last longer.

Remember, by recycling more you’ll produce less trash, which means you’ll use fewer trash bags. The new PAYT program lets you take control of your waste disposal costs!   All authorized recyclables and diversion materials are included in the Transfer Station sticker fee and PAYT bags are NOT required for those items.