Doorway 4: Purchasing & Waste

Our society generates an enormous amount of waste and British citizens are becoming increasingly aware of the need to reduce waste and dispose of it in a sustainable manner.

British schools are no exception to this rule. According to A Bursar’s Guide to Sustainable School Operation, schools dispose of over 60,000 tonnes of waste each year, spending between £300 and £1,000 per year on waste disposal depending on their size.

In the past few years attitudes towards waste disposal have altered and the mantra “reduce, reuse, recycle,” has become a philosophy that is widely accepted and practiced in schools.

What schools often don’t realise, however, is that more could be done to minimise the waste that they produce by reducing consumption and procuring sustainable products and services.

Sustainable procurement is an opportunity that is not always fully understood or utilized by school buyers, but it is essential that schools become models of sustainable purchasing if they wish to embody sustainable values.

SCEMES Ltd realises that school buyers need to do business with suppliers that have high environmental and ethical standards, and has created this Handbook to help schools integrate sustainable procurement into their annual purchasing plans. The Handbook of Sustainable Procurement is the only directory offering school buyers a comprehensive list of sustainable suppliers and can help schools reduce their impact on the environment.

This section looks at other simple actions that schools can take to minimise waste and dispose of it in a sustainable manner.

In these pages HomeContact looks at some of the many opportunities that schools have to reduce their paper usage by using modern technology, and asbestos removal experts Trinitas Contracts explain how schools can adhere to sustainable school principles by keeping pupils healthy and safe.

In This Section

HomeContact - Paperless Communication
HomeContact explain how they are revolutionising school to home communication and saving time, money and trees!

Trinitas Contracts - Creating Safe, Healthy Environments
Asbestos removal experts Trinitas Contracts Ltd. outline the dangers that asbestos can pose and explain how they can help schools keep pupils healthy and safe.