Lismore Recycling & Recovery Centre tip: hours, fees, what you can take

Tip vouchers

Two vouchers per Lismore LGA household per financial year (one per 6-month period), each worth $82 at Lismore RRC or Nimbin Transfer Station. 30-day expiry; pool capped at 5,000 per year. Apply online with a rates assessment number or proof of tenancy.

Getting there

The Lismore tip is the Lismore Recycling & Recovery Centre at 313 Wyrallah Road, East Lismore, run by Northern Rivers Waste. Weekdays it's open 7.30am–3.30pm; weekends 9am–4pm; closed public holidays. Phone 02 6625 0500. The Revolve Shop tip shop and the Return and Earn depot are on site with shorter hours (Revolve: Wed and Fri 9–2, Sat 9–1).

Heads up: the site is being upgraded from August 2026 through to about February 2027, so expect changed traffic flow and the odd closed lane.

Lismore also runs the Nimbin Transfer Station on Blade Road (Tue, Thu, Sat 8am–3pm only — no e-waste, no building waste) and the Brewster Street drop-off for recycling.

Before you go

Lismore is the one tip in the region with a real, published discount for sorting. Figures checked August 2026:

• Unsorted household waste: $410 a tonne, minimum $15. This is the dearest mixed rate in the Northern Rivers.
• Self-sorted household waste (at least half recoverable, separated on arrival): $300 a tonne, minimum $10. That's $110 a tonne back for spending fifteen minutes sorting on the trailer.
• Green waste: $120 a tonne, minimum $10. Large stumps $168.
• Mattresses: $39 each, any size.
• Fridges and whitegoods: on the metals fee page; Nimbin's rate of $31 degassed / $52 gassed per item is the best guide.
• Free: e-waste, clean white polystyrene, Community Recycling Centre problem waste (paint, oils, batteries, gas bottles, fluoro tubes, smoke detectors) in household quantities.
• Vouchers: Lismore LGA households get two waste vouchers per financial year, worth $82 each, redeemable at Lismore RRC or Nimbin. Apply online with your rates assessment number or proof of tenancy; they expire 30 days after issue and the pool is capped at 5,000 a year, so apply early in the half-year. Leftover balance of $2 or more comes back as a secondary voucher.
• Asbestos: council says the site is licensed to take it (a 2019 report said it had stopped). Ring before you load any.

Lismore City has no kerbside bulky-waste collection; the vouchers are the council's answer.

What a trailer load costs here

A level 6x4 trailer of mixed household junk is about 350 kg. Unsorted, that's 0.35 t × $410 = about $144 at the gate (checked August 2026). Sort it on the trailer — metal and e-waste to one side, cardboard separate — and it drops to 0.35 t × $300 = about $105, with the free streams weighed out on top of that. A heaped trailer (around 500 kg) is roughly $205 unsorted or $150 sorted. The same trailer of green waste is 0.35 t × $120 = about $42.

Hand over an $82 voucher and a sorted level trailer costs you about $23.

That's the gate only, plus your fuel, your Saturday and the loading. Or it's from $170 and we do it — both of us, all the lifting, tip fee included, sorted so you're never paying the unsorted rate, and your voucher comes off the price.