With the Waste (Scotland) Regulations 2012, which actually came into effect on 1 January 2014 in Scotland, requiring all the country’s healthcare facilities to separate their waste for recycling, waste management consultants, Jess Twemlow and Dr Adam Read of Ricardo-AEA, consider what healthcare facilities south of the border can learn from Scotland’s experience about improved waste management and resource efficiency.
Healthcare organisations are facing an ever-increasing number of challenges relating to their environmental performance. With widerreaching environmental legislation, and increasing costs for energy and waste disposal, the drivers for NHS Trusts to actively engage in positive environmental management have never been greater. .
Unfortunately the healthcare sector has historically been shockingly poor at recycling. Based on the Estates Return Information Collection (ERIC) data for 2013/14, NHS England achieved only a 24% recycling rate. Considering that NHS Trusts alone generate almost 375,000 tonnes of waste per year, and figures of 50% or more are realistically deliverable; there is significant potential for the NHS Trusts to significantly reduce the waste sent to landfill, and, in the process, alo reduce their waste management costs.
With the healthcare sector throughout Britain facing significant funding pressures, and with many Trusts having to find cost savings year on year, there is a concern that it is simply too expensive to implement new recycling systems. New systems with associated costs that will detract from frontline health services, clutter up the wards, distract healthcare professionals, and create infection control risks, are a low priority.
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