Posted on February 20, 2017 by Terry Tudor

Waste Stories 20/2/2017

1. The Group’s 2017 conference

The Group’s 2017 conference will be held on Thursday October 5, at the Northampton Town’s football ground in Sixfields, Northampton. The event will focus on the sustainable management of food waste from the healthcare, retail and hospitality sectors. It will feature speakers from WRAP, the Co-op, Northamptonshire Waste Partnership, NHS organisations and Severn Trent Water. The event will be sponsored by Sharpsmart and Olleco.

2. EU sustainable energy awards competition

The Awards offer no monetary prize, but allow organisations to demonstrate commitment towards a cleaner environment, inspire others and be recognised at European level. Nominees and winners will benefit from communications support and increased visibility to stakeholders, the press and the general public.

For more information click here

3. Launch of SDU Health Check report 2017

The Department of Health in partnership with NHS England, Public Health England (PHE), NHS Improvement, the Care Quality Commission, Health Education England, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), NHS Digital and NHS Property Services have stated their organisational commitments to deliver a socially and environmentally sustainable health and care system.

Read the report here

4. RCP annual conference (March 16 & 17 – Manchester: UK)

The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) is launching a programme of work focusing on healthcare sustainability at the Medicine 2017 conference in March. You will be able to find the RCP sustainability team on the RCP Hub stand at the conference, or email them on sustainability@rcplondon.ac.uk.

For further details, click here

5. European Commission highlights five key actions to combat food waste

Speaking at the very first meeting of the EU Platform on Food Losses and Food Waste in November 2016, Commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitis highlighted five key areas of action to help combat food waste among Member States.

Read more here

Posted on February 7, 2016 by Terry Tudor

Waste Stories 8/2/2016

Ray Wright

1. Joint Healthcare Waste and Resources Research Group and ISWA International conference (sponsored by Grundon Waste Management)

In conjunction with the International Solid Waste Association (ISWA), the Group will be hosting an international conference on April 14 and 15, 2016. It will be held at St Thomas’ Hospital in London.

One of the speakers will be Ray Wright, who is the Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Waste Manager, one of the UK’s largest. The Trust’s Royal Hallamshire Hospital was one of three UK centres providing surge capacity to the Royal Free Hospital during the 2014/15 Ebola virus disease epidemic. Ray developed the organisation’s Ebola waste stream handling infrastructure and created waste protocols for its surge capacity responsibilities.

He has been a Waste Manager for NHS Trusts in Sheffield and Lincolnshire for over 7 years, and prior to this worked as an Environment Agency regional hazardous waste coordinator.

His presentation will outline a waste manager’s personal experience of providing a waste handling infrastructure and protocols for a potential Ebola virus disease patient at a surge capacity hospital. It will demonstrate the logistical challenges of managing large quantities of Category A waste for the duration of a patient’s treatment.

The full programme can be found here: Programme – Jan 2016

Sponsors include: Daniels, Econix, GV Health, Frontier Medical Group, Newster, Sharpsmart and ISS Ltd. (Please contact Terry Tudor: terry.tudor@northampton.ac.uk, if you wish to sponsor)

Booking details can be found at: healthcare waste 2016 conference

2. Amendments to scope of the RoHS Directive

Restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment, 2011/65/EU.

Read the amendments here

3. EU Sustainable Energy Awards 2016

The SEE Awards recognise the best sustainable energy projects taking place across Europe. A wide range of organisations are eligible to apply including businesses, non-profit organisations and public sector organisations.

There are three categories for the 2016 awards:

Consumers – rewarding actions leading to the behavioural change of individual energy users.
Public Sector – rewarding public and non-profit organisations taking exemplary initiatives in energy efficiency or use of renewables.
Businesses – rewarding forward-thinking businesses which are exemplary in their production or use of energy.

There will also be a Citizens’ Award to reward the nominee which best captures the public imagination.

Entries will be assessed on the following three criteria:

Excellence and innovation
Impact and contribution to the 2030 objectives
Replication potential and social acceptance

For 2016, the project must be ongoing or concluded after 30 June 2015.

The deadline for entries is 22 February 2016.

View details of the Awards and 2016 EU Energy Week here

4. New drive for paper-less NHS

Read the story here