Do not skip options for recycling your waste
Thursday 12th August 2004
Waste, and what we do with it, has raced up the environmental agenda this summer. July to be precise, with the introduction of a range of legislation coming to the aid of the planet by reducing bulging landfill sites. Much of this legislation will impact on companies producing hazardous waste. And if you run a print firm, that means you.
For those who care little for the environment, the bad news is that the practice of dumping non-hazardous and hazardous wastes at the same landfill sites will cease. Instead, almost all hazardous waste will now have to be treated to lessen its impact on the environment. So the innocent days of chucking all your waste, no matter how toxic, into the factory skip are over - unless you want to fall foul of the regulations or face soaring disposal costs.
Landfill taxes have rocketed and some skip providers could start either refusing to take hazardous wastes such as ink tins, electrical equipment, solvent drums and fluorescent tubes, or take them at extra cost to cover the expense of transporting them to only 10 UK sites now authorised to accept them.
By far the most positive way of viewing this tightening of the regulatory screws is to get more involved in what happens with your waste. There should be a waste management programme with recycling at its core. It is time to get up close and personal with your rubbish skip.
Let us face it, the industry has never been noted for being green and many reusable by-products are routinely discarded. Recycling has been largely ignored in favour of the dump-it option. And yet, there is almost no printing industry by-product that cannot be recycled or reused in some way. Aluminium plates to empty drums, light tubes to wooden pallets, drinks cans to CDs, chemicals to press blankets - all have a useful life beyond landfill.
Best then to explore the recycling potential of your factory waste with a registered and licensed waste operator that legally authorised to take the hazardous stuff. The planet will love you for it.
