Recycling website wins Cabinet Office award
Designed to help explain the difference between local authority recycling schemes and what can be recycled in what areas, the ‘Can I Recycle It' website designed by Adam Temple, 26, won the £60,000 top prize in the ‘Show Us a Better Way' competition launched by the Cabinet Office. The competition funded by the Cabinet Office, the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Ministry of Justice was designed to encourage ideas and develop a website aimed at improving the spread of information about public services.
Cabinet officer Tom Watson said: “By trusting the public and throwing it open to them to put forward their ideas, the solutions are of real, practical use. Ultimately, this is about building something from the bottom up rather than having Whitehall dictate from the centre.”
Royal visit to mark Abitibi charity work
In her role as president of the charity, the Princess Royal unveiled a plaque commemorating 25 years of operations at the Bridgewater paper mill in Ellesmere Port and the first paper bank with the new livery for Save the Children which reads “We Save the Children. Will you?” The new livery will be appear on the paper banks, for which Abitibi donates £5 per tonne of paper collected to Save the Children, and will be used in addition to AbitibiBowater's kerbside recycling programme, which sees the firm donate £1 per tonne for every tonne collected at the kerbside. The firm has accumulated over one million tonnes of paper, cans, glass and textiles since the scheme began in 1987.
Ron Humphreys, managing director AbitibiBowater said: “The partnership has enabled us to fund vital projects around the world, including the UK, where not many people realise that a staggering one in five children still live in poverty.”
Shanks positive about future for SRF
Waste management firm Shanks has claimed that the market for solid recovered fuel market (SRF) in the UK is strong despite the closure of one of the cement kilns which burns its fuel.
CEMEX is proposing to close its cement kiln at Barrington, in South Cambridgeshire, which currently burns SRF produced by Shanks. However, a spokesman for Shanks told letsrecycle.com that the amount of fuel which Shanks supplies would not be affected, and would be diverted to other Cemex sites. He said: “Our supply of Climafuel will be unaffected as it will be diverted to CEMEX's other facilities. It won't make any difference and we will continue to provide solid recovered fuel as contracted. We are reasonably confident because we produce SRF to meet demand so we won't end up with a surplus of material.”
The spokesman added that he believed the economic downturn, which has lead to the cement kiln closure, could in fact have a positive effect on the market for SRF in the UK. He said: “As the situation gets more difficult people who run high energy facilities will look to SRF because it is a low cost option. It could work to our advantage.”
Depot raises £155 for Breast Cancer Campaign
Last Friday (31 October), staff at the Holmes Road Depot in Kentish Town, which is operated by Veolia Environmental Services, were encouraged to ‘wear it pink' for the day for a £2 charge, and raised £155 for their efforts with all proceeds going directly to the Breast Cancer Campaign.
Teresa Davey, operations manager for street cleansing in the north of the borough at Veolia, said: “With over 3,000 women every month getting the devastating news that they have breast cancer, we really wanted to show our support and raise awareness amongst our staff about this serious issue. We're only a small depot, so to raise this much makes me very proud of everyone here.”
Updated Demolition Protocol launched
The Institution of Civil Engineers' has launched an updated Demolition Protocol for 2008, which is intended to offer reduction and recycling guidelines for the sector ahead of 2012 targets for recycling construction waste.
Supplementing a previous document from 2003, the WRAP-supported Protocol is intended to help cut waste by 50% over the next four years and help reach the sector's 70% reduction and recycling target for 2020 set out by the EU Waste Framework Directive. The Protocol is also intended to ensure the principles of the waste hierarchy, clarify the role of policy-makers and provide a deconstruction and demolition recovery index (DRI), outlining the percentages of building elements or materials which need to be reused or recycled.
Nigel Mattravers, chairman of the ICE waste and resources management board, said: “The best decisions are made pro-actively, and the updated Protocol will enable policy-makers, clients, and agencies to better assess how they might re-use buildings, structures, elements, and products prior to demolition and recycling.”
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