⚪ Paper Drop-off
Papier · not a bin at home
Paper you read.
Not paper you wiped with, and not packaging. Clean, dry and loose — paper fibre is only worth recycling while it is still dry.
Note
Cardboard is not paper: small card goes in the yellow bin, large card goes to the déchèterie.
What goes here
Paper you read
- Notebooks remove spiral binding
- Newspapers †
- Magazines & catalogues †
- Leaflets & junk mail †
- Envelopes † windows are fine
- Printed & written paper †
- Books without covers †
- Paper bags † plain, unwaxed
Never in here
- ❌ Kitchen roll → general waste
- ❌ Tissues & face masks → general waste
- ❌ Coffee filters → compost
- ❌ Soft paper coffee pods → compost
- ❌ Paper plates & cups → yellow bin
- ❌ Cardboard egg boxes → yellow bin
- ❌ Small cardboard boxes → yellow bin
- ❌ Large cardboard → déchèterie
- ❌ Wallpaper, waxed paper † → general waste
Not here — where it goes instead
🟡 Yellow bin
All paper and card that was packaging — boxes, cartons, egg boxes, paper plates and cups. If it held a product, it is packaging. See Yellow Bin — Recyclables.
🟢 Green bin — trash
Any paper that is soiled, greasy or wet. Wet paper fibre cannot be recycled and spoils the rest of the load. See Green Bin — General Waste.
🟤 Compost
Coffee filters, soft paper pods, unsoiled kitchen roll — these are good brown material for the heap. See Compost.
♻️ Use the back first
Misprints and one-sided paper make free scrap paper. Recycling is the step after that. See Second Life — Reuse.
Handling
- Dry and loose. Never bagged, never wet.
- Staples and windows are fine. The mill removes them. Spiral bindings are not.
Printable sheet
Paper Drop-off — A4 sheet (PDF) — print at 100 % scale, single sided. All nine sheets together: all-sheets.pdf.
Items marked † are the general French sorting rule for this stream, not entries in SMECTOM’s Mémo Tri 2026. Everything else on this page is taken from the mémo. See Waste Sorting Guide for the overview and Waste & Recycling Collection for the pickup schedule and access card.