Practical Waste Management

Introduction

We are aware that many pressures, including legislation, mean that we will have to change the way we approach waste management. For decades we have been tossing things in the bin and forgetting about them, out of sight, out of mind, in our ‘throw away’ society. It took little effort to dispose of rubbish Times are changing and now we have to learn new habits. FHE institutions can play their part by examining their existing practices, adopting suitable good practice from elsewhere and ultimately reducing the amount of waste sent for final disposal. This may include awarding waste management contracts carefully and the implementation of new or improved recycling schemes. To move management of the current waste stream up the Waste Management Hierarchy, care must be taken to produce less and to re-use and recycle more, so that only a small amount of general waste should be left for final disposal. .

Moving up the waste management hierarchy can appear daunting. Establishing and maintaining a good recycling scheme can feel difficult: getting people to re-use more can feel even harder, and succeeding in minimisation of waste can seem impossible. It is a common assumption that moving up this hierarchy will be more costly in terms of time and/or money. The result is that there is more experience of techniques near the lower end of the hierarchy with some examples of recycling, a smaller amount of experience when it comes to re-using and very little for waste minimisation or avoidance.

The Current Position helped you to review your current waste streams. Now that you have some basic information, you can decide where it is necessary to change the current system, probably in a phased approach.

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Practical Waste Management

Introduction

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