DISPOSING of waste such as plastic, glass, paper, cardboard, metals and textiles in landfill sites is exacerbating the ever-increasing demand for raw materials and depleting the world’s non-renewable natural resources. This week business editor Sarah Gunthardt takes a closer look at Peterborough-based manufacturing giant Indesit Company, which has been exploring the disposal and management of its waste and made savings of up to £17,500 a year as a result.
INDESIT Company is the UK’s largest household appliance manufacturer and is now reaping the benefits of waste reduction at its Peterborough site after working with the Government-funded Envirowise programme.
It employs 5,500 people at its four factories in the UK, including the one in Morley Way, Woodston, where it manufactures some of the country’s leading brands, including Hotpoint and Indesit.
The Peterborough site houses the UK headquarters, its service centre, cooling factory and customer centre. It is a crucial element of the business and an area where the company had been looking to reduce waste and improve recycling.
In April last year Indesit sought help from Envirowise, an organisation which offers free, confidential, on-site waste reviews to help companies reduce their environmental impact and identify cost savings in the process.
Mike Birch, manager of central environment UK for Indesit Company, explained they had a series of FastTrack visits where environmental representatives from each of Indesit’s four sites worked with trained advisors from Envirowise to produce a tailored waste minimisation plan, including savings targets, suggested actions on how to consume fewer resources and advice on legislation.
After the FastTrack visit to its Peterborough site, Indesit Company introduced a number of measures to improve waste handling and recycling and plans to roll out the measures across its three other UK plants in due course.
Dave Truss, facilities manager at the Peterborough site, said: “The Envirowise visit was an opportunity for us to look at the site with a fresh pair of eyes. The data produced from the Envirowise report served as a cost justification for further investment in waste minimisation and cost reduction. “Since the meeting, work has been progressing steadily with our incumbent waste handling company.”
Various schemes have been implemented which have resulted in Indesit Company installing two additional waste compactors, and an expanded polystyrene (EPS) granulation machine.
“Previously EPS was set to landfill in large volumes (but low weight) as the transport costs of recycling outweighed any benefit achieved. The new machine crushes the EPS ““ the light, white packaging for products ““ into bricks, which are then sold on for other uses. Cardboard handling has also altered, so it now raises revenue for the company and the same amount still goes for recycling. We now bale more of the cardboard waste from the factory and achieve a better return for it in this condition, as it is more suitable for recycling.
“The estimated savings achieved by installing the compactor and granulator are in the region of £17,500 per annum. It is fair to say that the Envirowise visit did formalise and add weight to our waste reduction drive on the site.”
Mr Birch further explained: “The FastTrack visits involved a waste survey and an audit of waste that is generated on the site, ie how that waste is managed and disposed of. As a result Envirowise came up with recommendations of ways they could reduce waste and cost on the site.
“With most organisations it stops there, but in our case, we have gone further with Envirowise and have set up a partnership agreement with the two companies which means on an ongoing basis we work together to implement the recommendations.
“We were keen to minimise the amount of waste generated from our processes. But also we have a lot of packaging material that comes into our organisation where a reasonable percentage of products we make are made up of parts supplied to us ““ all of which are packaged using card, paper, wood, in some cases. We now separate those waste streams so the items are suitable for recycling and so have a saleable value because they can go back into the recycling scheme and be made into new products, which means there are environmental and cost benefits resulting from that.
“We are pleased with the savings. Any company that currently doesn’t manage its waste, or doesn’t think about the recycling opportunities would benefit from a visit from Envirowise. Even companies currently managing waste may well learn something about improving their performance too.
“Since the Envirowise visits to our manufacturing sites we have actively worked to implement the recommendations made. Our initial success has meant that we now measure both waste material and recycled material weekly at two of our four manufacturing sites, with the other two sites planning to introduce their measures in March. During 2006 Indesit Company will undertake further work with Envirowise on waste minimisation at each of our sites and we would like to thank them for their expertise and assistance to date.”
From Peterborough Today