Envirowise has produced a range of publications containing advice on a variety of resource efficiency and waste minimisation topics. Publications include case studies, Good Practice Guides, Newsletters, Benchmarking Guides and tools. These can be ordered free of charge from the website or from the Advice Line by calling 0800 585794.
You may also find it helpful to search by sector, to identify companies in a similar business to your own that have cut costs and reduced waste, click here.
Case studies of companies from Wales can be viewed below. To view all regional case studies, click here.
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Dow Corning saves more than £30,000
A South Wales company is reaping the reward of making environmental improvements after achieving annual savings of more than £30,000
Dow Corning, of Barry, has carried outvextensive initiatives to improve efficiency at its Barry site with help from Welsh Assembly Government-funded sustainability experts Envirowise.
Dow's achievements include lowering its annual waste by a factor of 10 times per year on one process and increasing plant efficiency by more than 10 per cent on another. It has also developed a partnership with neighbouring company Cabot Carbon Ltd, allowing both firms to use by-products from the other's processes.
Mike Squire, Dow Corning's environmental team leader, said: "We are continually investigating ways to achieve greener processes as part of our commitment to environmental sustainability.
"In addition, there are also many business benefits to the enhancements we're making. Using the basic principles of reduce, re-use and recycle as our starting point, we have looked first at eliminating and reducing waste at source, followed by innovative by-product recovery and re-use."
Ed Gmitrowicz, Envirowise programme manager for Wales, added: "By working with Envirowise, the company has identified ways to not only ease its impact on the environment, but also to reduce its production costs and increase efficiency."
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Knox & Wells
Cardiff based building contractor Knox & Wells is already benefiting from implementing a Site Waste Management scheme, thanks to Envirowise. The company, which has seen a massive reduction in the amount of waste sent to landfill, started the scheme on its Cowbridge road site during a recent renovation and has managed to take 57% off its usual waste management bill.
Bob Jennings of Knox & Wells says “Site waste management plans are a really useful tool when it comes to monitoring waste and reducing the associated costs. Simple actions can make a significant difference.”
Before the SWMP came into effect the Cowbridge road site was “a small site with little space for storing materials for re-use,” according to Bob Jennings “but we overcame these issues by conducting a pre-work survey to identify and quantify potential waste. This was then segregated into dedicated skips and re-used wherever possible, saving us more than £2,300.”
Knox & Wells also achieved additional savings of £1,177 through careful skip management and another £667 in reduced skip costs.
For more general advice on sustainable use of construction resources please visit www.envirowise.gov.uk/construction or call the advice line on 0800 585 794.
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How green is your valley?
A crisp manufacturer in Crumlin, Gwent is on course to achieve cost savings of £20,000 a year by taking simple steps to reduce its effect on the environment.
Sirhowy Valley Foods, which produces hand cooked crisps under the Real Crisps brand and under private label brands for UK supermarkets, took part in the Envirowise Retailers Supply Chain Forum earlier this month and has achieved significant cost savings and reductions in its effect on the environment as a result.
The Retailers Supply Chain Forum was launched by Envirowise, which helps businesses to become resource efficient, to encourage suppliers and retailers throughout the supply chain to become more environmentally responsible and save money at the same time. As a new supplier to Boots, Sirhowy Valley Foods was invited by Envirowise to attend the Forum in July. As part of the scheme, the company also attended the Envirowise Energy and Green Purchasing Workshop this month, identifying the need to reduce energy and water waste.
Peter Menzies, Operations Manager for Sirhowy Valley Foods, said: "Envirowise sent one of their environmental advisers, Peter McKendry, to visit us on a free Fast-Track visit. Peter helped us to examine why the quality of our effluent water might have deteriorated since we moved premises and identified potential cost savings of £20,000 per year in water and effluent processing, and energy costs on the fryer line.
"As a result of his visit we have replaced a number of leaking water valves at a cost of £800, which will reveal an 18 week payback in water and effluent savings and will save us a total of £2,300 a year. We have also established a recycling path for raw material waste; sending potato and crisp rejects to animal food and corrugated cardboard to recycling and diverting both from landfill."
Building on these environmental successes, Sirhowy Valley Foods has formed an Environmental Management Team of five managers, under the direction of Peter Menzies, to raise awareness of environmental issues within the business.
The team is now driving the improvements forward even further with the development of cutting-edge biodegradable crisp packaging for Real Crisps.
Peter Menzies continued: "We realise that our waste laminated metallised polypropylene film is destined for landfill and as such, we are working with a foreign film supplier which believes it can provide the same crisp packaging requirements but with biodegradable material. While the new material will be more expensive to purchase, it will significantly reduce our landfill costs. If our current trials on the material on site are successful, we are sure that our major customers will also see the new packaging as a major environmental step forward and no doubt one they would like to share in.
"As a successful growing business, we realise that our generated waste impacts not just on our costs but also on the environment. Many of the waste reduction actions that our new Environmental Management Team has identified with Envirowise involve little or no cost to us, yet they achieve on-going savings and huge benefit to the environment."
Angela Boffy, Envirowise spokesperson for Wales, said: "As larger businesses across Wales come under increasing pressure to put sustainability at the heart of their operations, smaller suppliers need to consider how their efficiency can help them gain the competitive edge.
Sirhowy Valley Foods has proved that simple, low cost actions on resource efficiency can make suppliers leaner and more competitive - and give them evidence of a sustainable approach.
"Our experience of running the Envirowise Supply Chain Programme with some of the country's biggest names including Boots, ASDA and Manchester United has demonstrated the potential for suppliers at every step of the supply chain to cut costs and lower their environmental impact."
The Envirowise programme is available to any UK business, completely free of charge. For more information visit the Envirowise Wales pages or call 0800 585794.
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Food Company saves £350k on waste costs
Headland Foods Ltd, a local ready meal manufacturer, has made significant savings thanks to free advice from Envirowise.
The government-funded programme which helps companies become more resource efficient has advised Headland Foods on ways it could reduce its waste. Since starting the initiative they have gone from recycling very little waste to 90 per cent of all waste. The move is saving the company an incredible £250,000 a year on landfill costs, made up of reductions in the amount of landfill tax it has to pay and an extra income of £30,000 per year which it receives from recyclers.
In addition, the company, which employs 380 people at its site in Flint, also saves £100,000 per year on waste disposal costs, made up of effluent disposal charges and reduced packaging costs.
Technical Director Ray Boggiano said: 'As part our efforts to reduce the environmental impacts in a large food manufacturing business, the biggest contribution we could make was to reduce waste. We contacted Envirowise who helped us to develop a Waste Management Plan, which now forms part of our wider environmental management system. Envirowise have also assisted us via 'The Big Splash Campaign' which has resulted in significant savings in Water use and Effluent disposal costs.'
"The changes we have implemented are not just good for the environment, they also make sound economic sense."
Headland Foods set the changes in motion two years ago, along with Envirowise and Environmental Expressions a Waste Management specialist company, identifying different waste streams first at their Grimsby site and later at their Flint site. Having trained all employees in waste awareness, they established recycling zones within the factories with containers in all areas of the site for each different waste stream, including cardboard, plastic, wood, metal, scanboard and general waste. The company uses on-site bailers and compactors to store the different kinds of waste prior to collection by the appropriate recycler.
"It is not just about recycling materials but also reducing the amount of waste we produce at source," continued Ray. "We have worked with our suppliers to reduce the amount of packaging used on the raw materials we use, as well as cutting back on the amount of packaging we use on our products."
Angela Boffy, Envirowise spokesperson for Wales, said: "The success of Headland Foods' simple waste reduction methods shows just how much money businesses can save by taking simple steps to become more resource efficient. With paper and board packaging waste exceeding 4 million tonnes per year1, we are urging other businesses to follow in their footsteps in reducing unnecessary packaging and other types of waste. They could be surprised at the savings."
Welsh businesses can source free, independent, confidential advice on a wide range of issues relating to resource efficiency by calling the Envirowise Advice Line on 0800 585 794 or by visiting the Envirowise Wales pages.
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Caerphilly top of the pile for resource efficiency
Efforts by Caerphilly County Borough Council and Envirowise to cut council office waste have helped the area divert a staggering 450 tonnes of office waste from landfill sites.
In addition, the authority is third in Wales for recycling - with 31.4 per cent of municipal waste being recycled or composted in 04/05, an increase of 8.6 per cent from the previous year.
The Council, which employs 9000 people across its network of civic offices, depots and other establishments, has been working with Envirowise - which helps companies to become more resource efficient - to reduce the level of resources it uses and to use them more efficiently.
The impact has been significant - reducing paper waste and water use at source whilst also introducing processes to recycle the remaining waste.
Rhodri Lloyd, spokesman for Caerphilly Council, said: "Caerphilly County Borough Council has introduced a wide range of recycling infrastructure in its Council Offices and buildings, achieving significant results. This demonstrates that our staff are working more resourcefully than ever before and leading by example in sustainable waste management."
With the help of Envirowise's technical support and a number of online publications, the Council also installed simple water conservation systems, reducing its water consumption by ten per cent. Further improvements to the control of its heating systems resulted in reductions in gas consumption of 11 per cent.
Angela Boffy, Envirowise spokesperson for Wales said: "This is a fantastic success story for Caerphilly. In order to help other companies across Wales see where they can make savings, Envirowise has recently launched a free CD-ROM based toolkit which provides a step-by-step guide to help reduce the use of common resources such as paper, water and energy. A savings calculator establishes just how much an individual company could potentially save - which could be as much as £200 per employee."
For more information about Green Officiency, and to request a copy of the free CD-ROM toolkit, call Envirowise on 0800 585 794 or visit the Envirowise greenofficiency page.
General advice on waste saving can also be found at the Envirowise wales pages.
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Hospital plans for new recycling centre
A hospital in Wrexham has submitted a business proposal to transform a disused site into a waste recycling management compound to help reduce its impact on the environment.
Following advice from Envirowise, which helps businesses to become more resource efficient, Wrexham Maelor Hospital, part of the North East Wales NHS Trust, has made huge leaps forward in reducing waste and cutting back on energy. Hospital managers anticipate that the waste management compound will cut the amount of waste even further.
"The cost of waste and the desire to reduce our impact on the environment prompted us to get in touch with Envirowise," said Bob Jarvis, estates manager.
We contacted Envirowise who sent a consultant down to the site. He assessed all our processes and made some really helpful suggestions, many of which were simple to implement and made an immediate effect, such as segregation of waste and recycling Inkjet cartridges."
Since then the hospital, which employs 3,500 people, has been driving home the savings. Four months ago it appointed a dedicated Environment and Energy Manager, Natalie Campbell, to reduce the hospital's gas, electric and water bills and take the Trust up to Level 3 of the Green Dragon Environmental Management System, a Welsh Assembly Government target on environmental sustainability.
Natalie said: "Waste reduction is a very important part of my role, which is why we have put together the business case for the waste management compound. I also have plans to introduce a cardboard recycling scheme as well as other waste streams, which we believe will generate significant savings for the hospital. Envirowise has given us great hands-on advice through visits and workshops, and a lot of tips on resource efficiency through the website and the free Advice Line. Its support has been invaluable."
Angela Boffy, Envirowise spokesperson for Wales. "At Envirowise we are working with companies on an ongoing basis to support them in switching to more resource efficient behaviour. We welcome the work that Wrexham Maelor Hospital have done so far, they are a great example of what companies can achieve if they take advantage of the support on offer."
The Envirowise programme is available to any UK business, completely free of charge. For more information visit the Envirowise Wales pages or call 0800 585794.
