14th-20th October 2024
It’s Recycle Week and this year the theme is ‘Rescue Me’. Darren Mclean, Environmental Services Manager for Brindleyplace tells us about all the ways he and his team are on a mission to recycle and rescue what they can around the estate!
We constantly encourage everyone to rescue recyclables from the rubbish bin and we are in the process of educating all our tenants (and the public) on easy ways to make changes that will have a major impact.
We have partnered with Greenzone Facilities Management, a national waste management and recycling provider to help us hit our sustainability targets and to aid this education process.
As a mixed-use estate, our tenants are varied – from restaurants and bars who will potentially have a lot of food waste to deal with – to office occupiers who may have more paper and cardboard. Additionally, we have the public to deal with, who quite often just for speed and ease, throw everything straight into any bin – not taking time or notice of whether their rubbish is recyclable. That’s where my team come in…
We are actively improving the waste management across Brindleyplace. Daily we spend time managing the segregation of rubbish into FOOD WASTE, DMR (Dried Mixed Recyclables) and GENERAL WASTE.
Where possible, we operate a clear bag policy so all waste can be easily identified, saving time and costs.
Food waste
Segregating food waste is an essential step in waste management practices and can have a significant impact on reducing overall waste disposal costs for our businesses. By separating food waste from other types of waste, we can avoid incurring overweight charges at disposal facilities and reduce the risk of contaminating recyclable materials.
Examples of food waste include – meat and fish skins and bones, leftovers, out of date food, teabags and coffee grinds, fruite and vegetable peelings, eggshells, etc.
DMR
This is the term for recyclables that are collected together in one service. DMR comprises of paper, cardboard, newspapers and magazines, plastics, tins and cans.
Examples of DMR recycling are clean plastic containers and bottles, flattened cards and paper, clean tins and cans, milk and juice cartons.
General Waste
General Waste is waste that cannot be recycled also known as residual waste. This is the kind of waste we don’t want! Items such as tissues, disposable coffee cups (no sleeves or lids) tin foil, food-soiled packaging, foil crisp packets and other foil packaging.
Our focus across Brindleyplace needs to be on reducing waste from the outset. By taking simple steps like using reusable cups instead of disposable ones, printing less, and reducing packaging, we can all be proactive in finding ways to minimise waste from the start!
