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He's the Birmingham eco warrior who has refused to put his rubbish out for an entire YEAR.

John Newson made a New Year resolution to fill less than one bin bag throughout 2012.

And the “extreme recycler” has completed his mission, as he will finally be putting out the single black bag for binmen today.

John, 60 and from Balsall Heath, said: “My aim was to discover how much of our rubbish can be composted, recycled or reused and my conclusion is that I think it’s around 90 per cent.

‘‘But that’s what’s possible, not what’s convenient.’’

Each week John has carefully sifted through his household rubbish, composting everything he can, while separating out paper, cardboard, plastic, glass and cans for his fortnightly kerbside recycling collections.

He even managed to recycle margarine tubs and Tetra Pak juice cartons by taking them to Bristol and London when visiting friends.

His single bin bag is full of plastic film packaging, which he has crammed tightly into plastic bottles to compress it down.

John said he wanted to push himself to the extreme and has had to return rolls of unused black bin bags to the council.

He said: “There are 52 weeks in the year and 400,000 households across Birmingham, so that’s 20 MILLION plastic bin bags that are being produced, distributed, collected and burned each year.

“Recycling some things is not that easy in Birmingham. I’ve had to take some items like drink cartons to Lifford Lane recycling centre.”

In Bristol, John says there are mini recycling centres on street corners, making it much easier to go green.

He said: “We’ve made a different decision in Birmingham, to burn all the waste.

“We need to make recycling convenient from the doorstep and I think a waste food collection is extremely important.”

John is now looking to repeat the incredible feat, by using only one bin bag in 2013.