Corporate Recycling Facilities

The Zen of Zero Waste

2015-02-20T12:41:00.002+00:00

What is Zero Waste? Really it is an idea, a philosophy, a theory. It is a bit of a Zen idea of being at one with the world and everything in it through an visionary environmental goal around how we deal with the world's waste.

If that sounds a bit on the metaphysical side, think about the definition of the The Zero Waste International Alliance: ‘Zero Waste is a goal that is ethical, economical, efficient and visionary, to guide people in changing their lifestyles and practices to emulate sustainable natural cycles, where all discarded materials are designed to become resources for others to use.

In actuality zero waste is about introducing processes and designs that avoid toxic waste and materials and conserve our resources, thereby protecting our environment and our world and not having negative impact on life on earth. So producers are encouraged to build in sustainable closed-loop processes and materials so as much as possible can be re-used and nothing becoming landfill waste. But how about the end-users?

People are trying. In Italy, in a town near Lucca called Capannori the people started changing the way they dealt with their rubbish when threatened with an incinerator. They now achieve an almost 90% recycling rate. San Francisco is aiming to achieve a zero waste goal by 2020, encouraging its citizens to think about how they can re-use, re-purpose and recycle.

Mindset is key to achieving zero waste so we all become aware of the lifecycle, use and re-usability of the things we use. Think Zen, think about being at one with the world. Get in touch.

That Cup

2014-07-08T14:38:00.002+01:00

Have a close look at the jerseys.........

They are made from recycled plastic bottles - 18 per jersey. Pretty impressive. The England team also wore strip made by Nike from recycled bottles in some of their games. And here are a few other interesting snippets from the World Cup:

The organisers expected each match would generate about 5 tons of recyclable waste.
850 'catadores', or rubbish pickers have been recruited and trained to sift through those 5 tons, separating out anything that can be reused or recycled, sending the materials collected to 300 trash pickers' cooperatives for sorting.
The main recyclable item collected are cans, and Brazil saves 98% of them from landfill, way above the European average of 67%.
Many Brazilians bought new TV's to tune into the World Cup as tickets were so expensive, and by the end of this year the country will have between 18-20 million more TV's.

So...enjoy the finals!

organizers expect each match to generate around five tons of recyclable waste based on the experience of last year's Confederations Cup.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2014-03-brazil-world-cup-recycling.html#jCp

DIY Data Removal

2014-05-05T17:41:00.000+01:00

Last year a survey conducted by a business waste disposal company came up with a very interesting statistic, claiming that 95% of all UK computer waste went to landfill; or put another way, of the 500 firms interviewed only 5% said they had strategies for environmentally proper disposal of their electronic waste. While you are reeling, let us tell you a story.

Some years ago, we were removing a batch of 300 PC's from a customer site and had arranged for resale of the computers to get best financial return for our customer. Having loaded all the units on to the artic, there was a series of hasty anxious conversations between the warehouse manager and the IT manager. We were then asked to unload all of the systems, as someone higher up the ladder was suddenly very concerned about data removal. Several days later, and considerable customer man hours later after they had some of their technical guys remove all the drives, we returned with the artic. Needless to say, resale value dived, their personnel costs rocketed and our costs to them for removal doubled owing to the additional trip.

The main reason for the alarming statistic about landfill lies in the understandably nervous approach some IT managers have about the disposal of their data, with concerns over confidential data landing up in the possession of unscrupulous and opportunistic individuals. There are enough apocryphal stories about personal data ending up in the public domain because someone somewhere did not properly check the disposal process. As a result of this quite a few companies, and indeed some of our clients as in the story above, have taken the decision to remove drives or otherwise conduct their own data removal prior to disposal.

This may give a degree of comfort to the organisation, having done the data removal themselves, however there are factors that should be taken into consideration before the decision to do this is made. Firstly the issue of additional time and resources that have to be allocated to complete any such data removal process on-site; secondly, the concomitant drop in resale value of the equipment meaning less return to the business, impacting on budget considerations.

Every business should be able to use a responsible waste management company to handle their WEEE and who can evidence environmentally compliant and secure disposal. Here at CRF we work to make our client's lives easier and to be secure in the knowledge that we have their interests at the core of our service. If you want to know more about how we do this please do get in touch with us.

Glass makes bricks

2014-04-16T11:21:00.002+01:00

Thousands of tons of CRT glass have been exported to the Netherlands where the glass is reprocessed and encapsulated into concrete construction blocks called - wait for it.... Legioblocks. And these blocks are then sold back to the UK.

The export is authorised by the Environment Agency and several UK CRT processing firms are very upset stating this practice would not be allowed in the UK, where the law stipulates that the CRT glass must be reprocessed in the UK to BATRRT (best available treatment recovery and recycling techniques). It seems the Legioblocks fall below British reprocessing guidelines and yet they are sold back to us.

The Environment Agency is defending its stance on the export to the Netherlands company - a spokesman saying "Once waste is turned into blocks it is not a waste product, as such it is not subject to waste regulations.”

WEEE Collection Targets for 2014

2014-03-11T15:16:00.000+00:00

BIS has sent proposals for the basis of calculating WEEE collection targets to compliance schemes which favour targets based on previous year's figures.

The Department is leaning towards this as a basis saying that this method is most likely to fit with the changing growth or decline in tonnage collected over the preceding year. The anticipated tonnage would therefore be around 490,000 of WEEE in 2014 representing a 3% rise on 2013's collection.

BIS perceive that this method will most accurately account for technological changes, the trading and economic climate and other variables affecting the WEEE marketplace.

2013-04-12T12:34:00.002+01:00

Women in Waste

The glass ceiling, the lack of women in high positions or on corporate boards - this is not new news. However Bea Perez, Coca Cola's chief sustainability officer has jumped on the bandwagon calling for women entrepreneurs to be more empowered: "Investing in women strengthens entire communities and bolsters local, regional, and national economies" she said in a webchat forming part of Coca-Cola's 5by20 initiative.

5by20 seeks to promote and enable the economic empowerment of 5 million female entrepreneurs by 2020 across the Coca-Cola value chain.

Why are we blogging about this? Because it focuses on the small businesses that Coca-Cola works with including recyclers. And we think it is something that pertains to the UK waste and IT recycling industry generally and to those departments within other businesses, so we would be interested in your comments and hearing from the women in this sector! Email Isla with your views!

Sustainability Planning

2012-11-20T11:08:00.000+00:00

The 2012 Sustainability Leaders Forum is on the 5th December at the CBI Conference Centre in London. The Forum is for progressive leaders who want to introduce and implement effective change in their organisation and supply chain. And the UK Sustainability Network for Standardisation is holding a free training day on December 4th. Both these events offer an opportunity to business leaders and employees to understand more about sustainability policies and procedures.

Sustainability is a political issue, alongside recycling. It also needs to be implicit in our business and working culture. The UK has taken great steps forward in instigating effective recycling policies, however there is still a lot to be done. We need to spend more of our energy on internal recycling initiatives and taking responsibility for our national sustainability. For businesses managing their IT disposals, sustainability affects the bottom line, impacting on budgeting, procurement and CSR. Some elements to consider include

Leveraging value in disposals and resales on surplus inventory
Compliance and regulatory issues
Safety and efficiency
Minimal impact through shipping and logistics

Creating the right sustainability plan for your organisation's IT assets means focusing on resource efficiency to adapt to environmental,economic and legislative change while maintaining profitability, engaging and developing your staff to perform and adhere to good sustainability standards, and ensuring the right data reporting to evidence best practice and leverage goodwill in developing new business and new opportunities.

For more information on any of the issues in our blog please get in touch with Mark or Isla.

March 2010 - What happens to your old equipment

2010-03-03T08:39:00.000+00:00

Some of our customers have had questions recently about what happens to the equipment that we collect for them so we thought you might like a brief summary of the processes.

London Facilities and CRS have been handling used and redundant computer equipment for over 15 years and have innovated and streamlined to keep up with changes in environmental legislation and technological development.

Our aim is to provide a compliant and secure service that is not only cost effective but also friendly, flexible and efficient. Our broking arm helps us to keep costs down, extend the useful life of equipment and reduce environmental impact and waste.

The journey your equipment takes starts when we collect your inventory and you sign the Transfer Note. The equipment is then taken to a storage facility for assessment of age and condition which includes identifying complete units and components for resale, and auditing all items by asset/tag number or headcount.

This is followed by data destruction which can be done in a variety of ways. Some clients request physical destruction of disks, otherwise we would use a data wiping system such as Blancco, DBan, Killdisk or manufacture specialist wiping such as HP Smartstart.

Physical processing follows where the equipment is stripped for useful components, PCB’s and materials recovery. Plastics and metals and glass are then recycled.

The paperwork you receive includes a copy of the transfer note, audit of the equipment and certificate of disposal. If we have been able to resell complete units a credit will be returned to you.

We hope this clarifies things for you and please do contact us if you need any further information.

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September 2009 - Reviewing Your Asset Management

2009-09-01T09:00:00.003+01:00

Many IT managers see asset management as a complex process and one which tends to drift down their task list.

Streamlining your asset management can mean saving costs and improving budgeting. The implementation of the WEEE Directive has led to the belief among many IT departments that the onus for recording electronic waste rests primarily with their suppliers. In practice all organizations are responsible for their own electronic waste disposal and the appropriate recording of these disposals.

Points to remember:
Ensure all contractors are properly licensed by the Environment Agency.
Keep proper records of each disposal including transfer notes, audits where appropriate and certification of disposal.
Let your contractor know what type of audit you require before collection and processing
If you think there is value and your equipment might be resold, try to give as much information as possible on the specifications.
Have regular audits of your inventory to enable you to take advantage of potential resale values of your equipment.
Check you have the relevant site registrations up to date e.g. Hazardous Waste registration numbers.

We know that most of our clients are on top of their asset management systems and if we can help in any way to bolster these systems, do get in touch and let us help take the headache out of managing your IT assets.

Kind regards

Isla Rowley

isla@londonfacilities.co.uk
Tel +44 1672 511112
Fax +44 1672 511113
www.londonfacilities.co.uk

August 2009 - Looking for Stock

2009-08-01T09:00:00.003+01:00

We have some enquiries from buyers looking for some used IT hardware including:

HP Laserjet 2400 series
HP servers
HP Pavilion notebook
Cisco ACE
Cisco memory
Nortel 5510 switch or similar
Dell laptops

If you have any items for disposal and you think they might have value please call/email us with details.

For helpful and flexible service contact us for specialist advice on all aspects of IT disposals, resales and asset management issues.

Wishing you a good summer and looking forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Isla Rowley

isla@londonfacilities.co.uk
Tel +44 1672 511112
Fax +44 1672 511113
www.londonfacilities.co.uk

July 2009 - Keeping to the Rules

2009-07-01T09:00:00.002+01:00

A recent article in the Guardian about abuses of the WEEE Directive and the problem of shady scrap touched on the difficulties faced by some of the 500 companies that joined the government disposal schemes.

With the collapse in metal prices as a result of the recession and the fact that some of the larger players invested heavily in special equipment for stripping and recycling equipment, the companies that are running systems for safe reclamation of materials are being affected by the less scrupulous operators.
The problem, according to the bigger players, is that those groups have a vested interest in paying the cheapest price for that process and there is no cost to recycle equipment that has been marked as working and reusable. Enter the shadier side of the scrap metal business. A large amount of the scrap is therefore making its way abroad and having a detrimental effect on the environment and workers in the industry in other countries.
Producers of waste need therefore to be confident that the disposal companies they use are fully compliant and provide the requisite paperwork for collections. London Facilities and our partner CRS are committed to ensuring best practice in the clearance, resale and disposal of your redundant IT hardware. If you have any questions about our processes or services we would be delighted to help.
For helpful and flexible service contact us for specialist advice on all aspects of IT disposals, resales and asset management issues.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Isla Rowley

isla@londonfacilities.co.uk
Tel +44 1672 511112
Fax +44 1672 511113
www.londonfacilities.co.uk

June 2009 - World Environment Day (WED) 2009

2009-06-01T09:00:00.004+01:00

Mexico is the host for the World Environment Day 2009 on 5th June. The theme this year is Your Planet Needs You - UNite to Combat Climate Change.

The focus includes helping people to become active agents of sustainable and equitable development and focusing on the pivotal role communities play in changing attitudes towards environmental issues.

WED was established in 1972 by the UN to promote worldwide awareness of the environment and stimulate political action towards protecting the environment.

Mexico is a main partner in the UNEPs Seven Billion Tree Campaign to which aims to see one new tree planted for every person alive by the time of the Copenhagen Climate Convention meeting later in the year.

London Facilities ran a competition for best tips on paper saving and these were the rather more useful and interesting suggestions:

Dont use paper cups.
Use your shredded paper for hamster cage padding.
Buy two ply toilet paper and pull the sheets apart...
Write on both sides of the paper.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Isla Rowley

isla@londonfacilities.co.uk
Tel +44 1672 511112
Fax +44 1672 511113
www.londonfacilities.co.uk

May 2009 - A new use for computer components

2009-05-01T09:00:00.002+01:00

London Facilities is teaming up with CRS in Essex to donate computer components to build a 10ft high robot which will be used to promote a new game for the latest Transformers movie. It will be made out of old computer bits including server cabinet parts, racking and the like. We will keep you posted on the launch.

LFL has been involved with similar projects in the past, providing free computer spares to students studying computer electronics back in the 1980s and donating computers to schools.

CRS work alongside LFL in the transportation and recycling of all electronic and computerised equipment to provide a complete secure service for asset disposal.

LFL continue to specialise in helping our clients to maximise on their IT budget by securing best prices for second hand traded goods and keeping costs down on all disposals.

And a small amusing take on what you can recycle from a US newspaper:

Tombstone. Standard Gray. A good buy
For someone named Grady. 505-378-xxxx

Look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards

Isla Rowley

isla@londonfacilities.co.uk
Tel +44 1672 511112
Fax +44 1672 511113
www.londonfacilities.co.uk