SOUTH WESSEX WASTE MINIMISATION GROUP: 26th March 2008
MINUTES OF MEETING
- Present
(see attached)
- Reformed Plastics (David Mercer)
Reformed plastics manufacture plastic ‘wood’ products from 100% locally sourced HDPE plastic waste. The company are also major distributors for Lankhorst KLP Products who are based in Holland and have been running for over 30 years.
The main base of the products are in the form of planks and posts which can be used on their own for garden fences, along road sides and around fields and paddocks.
Plastic lumbar is a good alternative to wood and can be cut with a regular saw, drilled, nailed or screwed into, and routed as easily as wood. It is extremely strong and able to withstand stress levels of well over 10 tonnes.
Some of the benefits of this product are:
- Does not rot
- Will not need painting or staining
- Is wear resistant
- Resistant to vandalism
- Resistant to salt water
- Resistant to insects and bacteria
- Does not split or splinter
- Maintenance free
- Resistant to chemicals
What recycled plastic products are available?
Fencing and gates
Walkways and decking
Outdoor furniture including seating and benches
Fishing pontoons
Signage
Bollards
Litter bins
Artificial sports surfaces
Children’s play equipment
Specialist sports equipment – golf tees, skateboard ramps and horse jumps
Drainage products
Paving/driveways
Costs:
The initial amount payable is more than wood but the products are an investment as they never need to be replaced.
Recycled plastic products can offer savings of up to 50% per annum in whole life costs over a period of 40 years.
For more information about products and services contact reformed plastics on 01202 385751 or by e-mail at
- Business Recovery Strategies: Shaun Lindfield (Precision Disc Castings Ltd.)
Shaun provided some background to PDC who operate a foundry in Poole and manufacture brake discs for the automotive industry.
Shaun explained that he would outline the key features of Business Continuity Management (BCM) which basically identifies threats to a business and a framework for recovery.
Expecting the Unexpected:
Nearly 1 in 5 businesses suffer a major disruption every year. With no recovery plan you have less chance of survival.
Business Continuity Management (BCM)
‘An holistic management process that identifies potential threat to an organisation and the impacts to business operations that those threats, if realised, might cause, and which provides a framework for building organisational resilience with the capability for an effective response that safeguards the interests its key stakeholders, reputation, brand and value creating activities’ (Business Continuity Institute, 2001)
Why implement BCM?
- It protects the business
-for legal reasons, such as: Civil Contingencies Act 2004, Companies Act 2006
-other bodies, such as ; Professional Bodies, Insurance Companies etc.
Implementation of BCM:
-Use BS25999-1, which is the BCM Code of Practice
-Speak to insurance company – they may have a BCM guidance/template
-Use specific BCM/Disaster Recovery Company to help
Key Features of a BCM:
Analyse your business
Assess the risks
Develop your strategy
Develop your plan
Rehearse your plan
1) Analyse your business:however well you understand your business, it will help to talk to other people. You will need the fullest picture of complex interactions inside your organisation and between you, your customers and suppliers. You can find out if any part of your business have plans or procedures to deal with a major incident. It will give you the opportunity to promote BCM and get people involved. You will need a senior manager to own the BCM and be a ‘champion’.
Who to speak to: the board and senior management team, department manager, facilities manager etc.
2) Assess the risks:There are 2 aspects to every risk to your business: How likely it is to happen and what effect will it have on your business? BCM can help you balance them. There are 3 questions to help provide an assessment of the risk:
- Ask what if? questions
- Ask what is the worst case scenario
- Ask what functions and people are essential, and when.
3) Develop your strategy:check that the board and senior management agree with your analysis of the business risks and which people and tasks are essential. This will allow you to choose one of the proven strategies – Accept the risks or attempt to reduce the risks.
4) Develop your plan: Most continuity plans share some important features including responsibilities, checklists, instructions for 1st hour after an incident, list of thought ideas for after the first hour, document review regulatory, plan for the worst case scenario. Include information from outside your business: emergency planning officer, emergency services, neighbouring businesses, utility companies, suppliers and customers, your insurance company. Use the consultation as a PR tool.
5) Rehearse your plan: Rehearsal can help confirm your plan is connected and robust if you ever needed it. You can rehearse your plan by – paper based exercises, telephone cascading or a full rehearsal.
Example from PDC:
Electricity supply was cut to the foundry due to a fire at a nearby scrapyard – PDC implemented their BCM.
-No production, damaging reputation, damaging profits
-Potential damage to machinery causing more production problems
-Safety concerns
To ensure that the incident has as minimal impact as possible the following occurred: - follow the 1st hour list
- Plan for the rest of the day/following days
- Inform staff, suppliers and customers where relevant
The BCM allowed for a clear audit trail which was useful for insurance purposes as there was damage to one of the furnaces due to emptying too quickly.
- Durable (UK) Ltd. Resource Efficiency Initiatives (Gary Jesson)
Gary explained that Durable (UK) Ltd. are a subsidiary of a German family owned company manufacturing plastic office products. The UK HQ is based on the Ferndown Industrial Estate and has 30 employees involved with marketing, sales, warehousing, distribution and finance.
The company are not a major user of resources but some of the initiatives introduced should apply to all and have the potential for bigger savings.
The key environmental impacts of the company are the use of raw materials and natural resources and waste management.
The company gained ISO14001 accreditation in 1999 and aim to continually improve across all impacts.
Electricity:
The company consume 4900 kwhs per month which costs £4800 per annum.
The company needed to ;
-monitor usage
-analyse usage
-look at the tariff structures
-look for sources of advice
1. The need to monitor:
- usage changes with the seasons
- usage changes as equipment changes
- Kwh prices change
- choice of supplier/tariff
Usage also varies with season – max 6710 (+37% Oct 2007) min 3625 (-26% July 2006)
2. Analysing Usage:
Day v night: use 66% of electricity in 8 hours
Use 33% of electricity in 16 hours, 14 of which no-one is on site!
-lighting?
-Air conditioning?
-Heating?
-Equipment?
Need to understand usage by function.
Meter reading – read monthly, calculate 12 month rolling average to allow seasonality.
Day/night usage – take at 1700 and 0900
The company calculated electricity usage using a meter - £27.00 Maplin Electronics
The objective was to get a braid indication of where major usage is and where major savings could be made.
Lighting (warehouse)26%
Computer equipment, photocopiers, faxes18%
Lifttruck charging16%
Lighting (offices)15%
Air conditioning10%
Water heaters5%
Other/unaccounted for10%
Actions:
-lower energy warehouse lighting?
-Replacement smaller fluorescent tubes/converters
Computer Equipment, photocopiers and faxes:
-CPU in use 75 watts, ‘off’ 5 watts
-VDU in use 23 watts, screensaver 24 watts, ‘off’ 2 watts
-Printer in use 20 watts, ‘powersave’ 14 watts
-Photocopier in use 47 watts, ‘off’ 37 watts
28% of power consumption is when they are not in use.
Save up to 5% of electricity costs by switching off
All screen at Durable are TFT flat screens – larger older CRTs consume more electricity.
Printers and photocopiers are shared therefore no one owns or switches off.
Savings of £240/pa were achieved.
Actions:
-provide extension leads
-fit timers to printers/photocopiers (<£10)
-brief/demo using meter and allow staff to take home to use
-re-measure day/night usage
3. Tariff Structures:
Important to know profile type in order to understand your bill:
MPAN no. (supply number) – this contains a profile number which reflects the pattern of expected usage across a 24hour period. An incorrect profile number may lead to incorrect pricing.
Supply Capacity – some tariffs charge a flat rate for kVA supply capacity available whether it is used or not. Scottish Power charge £1.04 per month per kVA available – at 75kVA = £78/month; at 50kVA = £52/month. Based on an average bill of £400/month = 6.5% reduction.
4. Sources of Advice:
- Envirowise: fast track visit
- Business Link
- Energy Brokers
- Internet
Water:
Durable use water for ‘domestic’ use only. 19 cubic metres per month/£540/pa.
2 urinals – significant proportion of use?
Ecocube product trialled following September 2007 SWWMG – very straight forward implementation. Costs circa £100 p/a on cubes and cleaning solution. Consumption dropped to 12 cubic metres per month, a 37% reduction saving £200 p/a.
- Success Story: MSA Foams Ltd. (Mike Huthnance)
Mike explained that the company design and manufacture returnable, reusable and durable packaging. This helps with reducing the impacts of packaging waste:
-waste of resources and landfill space
-waste of money – on-going expenditure and disposal costs
-waste of time (hidden costs) – wrapping, unwrapping, damage, time to repair/remake.
The company assessed their own resource efficiency opportunities on site and considered the following:
- Investment: lower than expected (negligible set-up/tooling), payment often within 6-9 months
- Lead Time: issue – design concept – sample – volume production = 3-5 weeks
- Usage: looped supply chain (look at your biggest suppliers), discipline: loss, theft, damage, returns. Share costs with your supplier.
The following initiatives have been introduced at the company for general waste streams:
Pallets – composted
Shrinkwrap, plastics – recycled
Cardboard – baled and recycled
Office waste – separated and recycled
Fluro tubes – recycled
Printer cartridges – recycled
The company have also obtained ISO14001 accreditation.
The company do have problems however with various waste streams:
a)Foam skins: could be used for insulation, cushioning, wrapping goods, palletised goods cover, archery centres have used them for fire practice!
b)Off cuts from band knifing: could be used for supports, isolator gaskets, crafts, kneelers, cushions, tool kit inserts.
c)Swarf/shreds from CNC machining: could be used for loose fill packaging
Currently these waste streams are not being recycled due to no UK technology, the waste is lightweight and therefore poor return for recyclers and it is cheap to landfill.
Mike had a number of sample for group members take. The company are open to ideas for re-use, secondary products etc.
Contact: Mike Huthnance (Operations Director)
Tel: 01202 850400
e-mail:
- Success Story: Dorset Village Bakery Ltd. (Steve Fudge)
Fudges are a family business, started in 1926 by Percy Fudge, manufacturing sweet and savoury biscuits. The company supply many of the multiples and also local retailers.
The company decided to look at their processes and try to reduce their environmental impact. This involved looking at the inputs, the process and the outputs.
Why?
- Dorset Family Business
- Appreciate the local environment
- Fudges want to leave the planet in a better state than we found it
- Efficiencies – profit
- Remain competitive
- Customer demand
How?
- Commitment from directors
- Buy in from all staff
- Company, departmental and personal goals
- External help
- Measurements recorded
- Identification of areas for improvement
The company had surveys undertaken by Envirowise and Carbon Trust to identify key areas for improvement.
The company are members of the SWWMG – networking opportunities
The company undertook the measurement of:
-utility usage
-waste generated
-waste recycled
-waste sent to landfill
The company also reviewed the packaging they use (obligated under the Packaging Regulations) and also analysed transport.
The aim of the company is to have zero landfill by December 2008 and to reduce their carbon footprint.
In January 2008 the company decided to look in detail at the 3Rs – reduce, re-use, recycle.
Raw materials were looked at:
-transport/food miles
-pallets
-outer packaging
-paperwork/ink
-cardboard
-plastic buckets
Efficiencies:
-use of power: full trays/full ovens/lighting
-machinery on standby
-paper production
-baked waste reduction
-raw waste production
-production planning
-reduce incoming packaging
-reduce outgoing packaging.
Examples:
Baked waste is fed to pigs – Pampered Pigs company
Palletwrap is now recycled
Cardboard is baled and recycled – 800kg/week was going to landfill
Electricity costs have been reduced from £150/day
5,500 litres a week has been saved on water
- Legislation Update (Tessa Bowering – Environment Agency)
The Packaging Regulations:
- The Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations (Amendment) Regulations 2008 came into force on 14th March 2008 which has increased the targets for recovery and recycling.
- Over the next year Defra will be looking at measures to increase aluminium recycling which is of high value and carbon rich.
- The Recovery Targets have increased as follows:
-72% for 2008
-73% for 2009
-74% for 2010
The Recycling Targets for 2008 have increased as follows:
- Glass78%
- Aluminium35%
- Steel68%
- Paper67.5%
- Plastic26%
- Wood20.5%
The WEEE (Amendment) Regulations 2007:
- Came into force on 1 January 2008
- 5 main areas:
-the counting and evidencing of whole appliances for re-use
-the issuing of evidence of WEEE to the nearest kg
-the right of the final holder of WEEE from private householders to return it to the system FOC
-extension of deadline for issuing evidence (from February to April)
-SoS prescribing the format for distributor records
Progress on the development of the UK WEEE System:
- 1556 Designated Collection Facilities (DCFs)
- 37 approved Producer Compliance Schemes (PCS)
- 4065 producer registrations
- 2680 members of the Distributor Take-back Scheme(DTS) – as of 5/11/07
- Approved Authorised Treatment Facilities (AATFs): 117 applications covering 202 sites for the second compliance period
- Approved Exporters (AEs): 32 applications for second compliance period
Further information:
(including FAQs and details of approved PCS)
Telephone: 08708 506506
e-mail: (put WEEE in the subject box)
or contact Tessa (01258 483416 or for local help/information)
EU Batteries Directive:
- Came into force on6th September 2006
- UK has to introduce regulations by September 2008
- Affects any business, including manufacturers and importers, that sell batteries and accumulators in the EU.
- Also affects third parties involved in collecting, treating and recycling batteries as well as businesses that throw away waste batteries.
- For further information:
- Supply chain Partnerships – Emma Burlow (Envirowise)
Emma provided some information in regard to supply chain opportunities and green procurement through Envirowise.
What’s on offer?
- Unique project for hosts and their suppliers
- 2 host companies – invite 10-15 suppliers each
- Aim to reduce waste and costs from joint business activities
- Free technical support from Envirowise
- 4 phases over 6 months
- Free support for suppliers – energy, waste, water, design
- Free training workshops
- Impact assessment and follow-up
- Case studies for exemplar suppliers
Aspects of the Programme
- Sharing experiences
- Problem solving
- Networking with other companies
- Targeted to your needs
- Direct access to expert support
- Free, independent technical support
Identify your key issues
Reduce environmental liabilities?
Safeguard/improve performance?
Save money by reducing waste?
Streamline processes and improve product quality?
Improve continuity of supply?
Re-thinking projects and processes
Companies who have already been involved include: Halfords. Virgin, Boots, WH Smith Plc.
20 hosts and 400 suppliers have been involved.
Benefits:
- Reduced raw materials use
- Improved process control
- Reduced water use and effluent volume
- Increased environmental awareness
- Reduced energy consumption
- Improved H&S in the workplace
- Reduced solid waste
- Improved waste segregation and recycling
- Reduced costs
Fast Track Savings = £2.4 million
Company Savings = £7.4 million
Potential Total = £9.8 million
Envirowise Advice Line:
Freephone 0800 585794
- any environmental question
- free specialist advice
- signposting to other sources of information
- requests for publications
Regional Contact: Paul Gilbert (0870 1903832)
- Any Other Business
Dorset Business Green Conference and Exhibition Thursday 17th April 2008 at the Portland Spa, SouthwellPark, Portland. For further details contact Lorraine Hubbard at
- Date and Venue of next meeting.
Thursday 5th June 2008, 10am at the Crown Hotel, Blandford Forum.