One in five homes has been given wheelie bins that have been fitted with microchips in preparation for pay-as-you-throw bin taxes, according to research by the Daily Mail.
It shows that a fifth of the town halls that collect household rubbish have equipped their bins with chips or have found other ways of labelling them.
The spread of microchips means that the number of councils prepared to bring in the charges has doubled over recent months.
Microchips or labels that can be read on dustcarts are key component of bin tax schemes which rely on weighing or measuring the rubbish put out by a home in order to sent the right bill to the right family.
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The increase in numbers of councils equipping their bins with chips suggests that Gordon Brown's repeated pledges to kill off bin taxes are unlikely to be fulfilled.
Local authorities are also planning tighter enforcement of bin rules and regulations.
One in four intend to bring in stricter 'bin police' regimes against families who leave their bin lids open, put their bins out too early, or leave extra rubbish alongside them.
The policing of rubbish bins by teams of council wardens has been a cause of growing public anger.
A bus driver in Cumbria was left with a criminal record because his family left their bin lid open a few inches because it was too full, and a war veteran of 95 in Norwich had his collections stopped because he put a ketchup bottle in the wrong bin.
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