If you haven’t seen this image on your social media timeline it is only a matter of time before you do. The Ministry of Environment and Housing have posted this image highlighting the impact of plastic and balloons being released into the environment.
A local traditions at memorials, schools, weddings, and other events balloon releases are something we have all done but have you ever considered the impact this can cause?
The Impact On Our Environment
Balloons that are released outside have end up somewhere, usually this is caught up in tree branches or electrical wiring.
Balloons that are not properly disposed of end up in the ocean and along coastal areas, becoming marine debris. This debris can be mistaken for food and eaten causing interal injury and potential death. The string attached to the balloons can also cause potential death as it wraps around marine wildlife and become entangled.
The Solution?
Instead of balloon releases you can instead have fun, celebrate, and remember with environmentally-friendly alternatives that The Ministry of Environment and Housing recommended.
If however balloon releases is not avoidable then the MCSUK have guidelines for wildlife friendly balloon use including the following:
Let go of balloons indoors only
Fill the balloons with air not helium.
Use balloons made of natural rubber latex rather than foil balloons.
When tying balloons use natural cotton string rather than plastic ribbon.
Hand tie balloons rather than using plastic valves.
Be a party pooper We all know reducing plastic in everyday life is easier said than done but something so simple as balloon releases can be an easy way to do your part.
It may be just one balloon but to a critically endangered species of marine wildlife it could be their last meal.
North West Waste Consultants are a modern and innovative business in waste management and recycling solutions based in St Helens, providing bespoke and tailored services to meet increasing demands for local, regional and national businesses.
With further rises in tax on waste-to-landfill, the cost of disposing of your waste is ever increasing. Added to this is the pressure to continually improve your business’ social and environmental impact by recycling more waste than ever before.
At North West Waste Consultants, they understand these challenges and work with customers across a variety of sectors to develop bespoke waste management solutions. Our cost-effective, efficient and convenient waste management services will reduce your carbon footprint, and increase your environmental performance and savings for your business.
Nationwide Skip Hire
North West Waste Consultants was set up in 2009 in St Helens by Warren Aspinall, with the view to help local and national companies reduce their landfill and general waste costs, ensuring higher rebates are paid for recyclables and food waste.
They achieve this by diverting as much waste as possible from landfill; therefore massively reducing waste costs as well as being environmentally friendly.
Every waste management program is bespoke to each specific site with the aim that within 12 months to achieve complete zero waste to landfill. With landfill prices increasing year-by-year we are always looking to use new and innovative methods for the disposal of waste in a cost effective and an environmentally friendly manner, with regular, weekly and monthly updates provided.
What We Offer
At North West Waste, they can help find the right waste solution for your business on a national scale, delivered seven days a week to any location across the UK. Supplying a full range of skips, from 4 yards up to 16 yards, as well as larger roll-on, roll-off containers, from 20 yards up to 40 yards.
North West Waste offer:
Skip and Waste Container Hire
Domestic and commercial use
General waste disposal
Recycling
Social Value
Regardless of where in the United Kingdom you have your next project, North West Waste Consultants has the experience and capabilities to fulfil your requirements. With access to a vast network of vehicles from wheelie bins to caged lorries wagons and much much more. They provide recycling and disposal solutions to the domestic, shop fitting, construction and specialist sectors of the market including hazardous, bulk liquid, asbestos, chemical, pharmaceutical and contaminated waste.
Depending on the size of skip you require, NWWC team of experts make managing your waste disposal as easy as possible.
We have experience of managing a wide range of waste management contracts. Our solutions are designed to deliver a high quality, legally compliant waste management service incorporating the management, site logistics, storage and collection of both hazardous and non-hazardous waste streams working closely with our waste management partners.
What Makes Them Different?
North West Waste ensure that the client is the priority with every job that they take on, which is why they provide a tailored waste management plan in order to fulfil your needs. The team are willing to provide a customised plan that will make you feel more valued as a customer, as they know that every job is different, and requires a lot of careful consideration.
This also helps to give your staff some industry know how for future waste disposal needs, which includes how to segregate waste correctly at source, this will help you to reduce your costs and divert your waste form landfill.
Unlike other skip hire providers, NWWC committed to a 100% recycling rate, meaning that anything you dispose of in your skip that can be recycled will be recycled.
Customer service
We pride ourselves on providing the best possible customer service. Our highly trained dedicated customer services team are at hand to provide advice and discuss your specific requirements. Our polite and courteous team will make sure you get the best skip solution for your needs and that the skip is delivered on time and with the minimum disruption.
Flexible and reliable
Skips can be provided as required or on a fixed contract basis. When an order is placed the skip will be delivered to you at a designated time by one of our highly experienced and qualified drivers. Our drivers will endeavour to make sure the skips are delivered on time and are positioned in the most convenient place possible.
With solutions delivering a streamlined waste management service for all waste streams through one point of contact, maximising management efficiency – a one stop shop. Compliance is at the heart of what we deliver; underpinned by accredited services in the industrial setting demonstrating a robust environmental and quality assured service.
North West Waste has the experience and capabilities to fulfil all your requirements. With access to a vast network of vehicles we provide recycling and disposal solutions to the domestic, hospitality, construction and specialist sectors of the market including hazardous, asbestos, chemical, pharmaceutical and clinical waste. The waste management industry has undergone many changes over recent years, however North West Waste is at the forefront of adapting our capabilities to meet the ever changing legislation.
As the weather heats up with the World cup and Wimbledon in full swing you may be in holiday mode, but that doesn’t mean we should take a break from sustainability.
Every year in Britain, we chuck away almost 450 million tonnes of household waste, most of which ends up in landfill. Rubbish like plastic bags can take hundreds of years to break down, so it’s best to find ways to both minimise and reuse our household waste. With many areas of the country only 10 years away from completely filling their local landfill sites, it’s crucial we all do our bit – starting now!
North West Waste would like to offer the following top tips to help make sure that looking after the environment remains high on your priority list over the summer:
Get some wear out of your old clothes Why not have a sort out and bag up any old clothes you don’t wear anymore? if you are clearing out your wardrobe to make room for summer clothes, or getting rid of everything you didn’t wear this summer come the autumn, Anything good enough to be worn again can be donated to a charity shop, anything else can be chopped up and used for stuffing, rags or patchwork blankets!
Greener barbecues
If you are having a barbecue this summer remember that much of the waste produced can be recycled. You can recycle all your paper, card and cardboard; glass bottles and jars; cans, tins and empty aerosols; plastic bottles, pots tubs, and trays as well as cartons.
If your barbecue preparation includes getting rid of an old grill, recycle it instead of throwing it away. Once you have finished recycling your old grill, replace it with a more eco-friendly version.
On road trips
Pack food and snacks in reusable containers and bring a reusable water bottle instead of buying bottled water. Don’t forget to bring along bags to collect recyclables in the car and look for recycling bins at rest stops, use reusable crockery rather than disposable knives and forks and paper plates. Buy loose fruit and vegetables rather than food in disposable packaging.
Don’t litter
This is an all-round good rule for any time of the year, but it may be more likely that you’re going out for a picnic somewhere in the nice weather! If you are, make sure to try and pack as much of your food in reusable containers to reduce waste (and save you money!). You should also take bags with you to make sure that you take any rubbish from your picnic with you.
If you’re a business looking for some solutions to your recycling or food waste problems this summer, don’t hesitate to get in touch with North West Waste to learn more about what we do.
Plastic Pollution – Morrisons to roll out 20p paper carrier bag
Morrisons is to sell 20p paper carrier bags as an alternative to plastic in all stores by next month following a successful trial. The bags are made in Wales from sustainably managed forests and are strong enough to carry heavy weights up to 16kg. The supermarket hopes the move will save an estimated 1,300 tonnes of plastic a year based on customer uptake during an eight-week trial across eight stores since January.
Welsh stores will be the first to offer paper carrier bags next week, followed by English and Scottish stores in May. The retailer said the Welsh-made reusable and ultimately recyclable bags had a carbon footprint equivalent to its standard plastic bags, which also now cost 20p.
With plastic use dropping by 85% at Britain’s ‘big seven’ supermarkets since October 2015, when the Government introduced the mandatory 5p charge.
Andy Atkinson, group customer and marketing director at Morrisons, said: “We are taking another meaningful step that will remove an estimated 1,300 tonnes of plastic out of the environment each year.
“Our customers have told us that reducing plastic is their number one environmental concern so introducing the paper bag across the nation will provide another way of reducing the plastic in their lives.”
Morrisons removed 5p plastic carrier bags early in 2018 which led to a 25% reduction in overall bag sales.The 5p plastic bag levy was introduced in England in October 2015 and all large retailers have been required to introduce the charge.
Similar schemes run in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Figures from the Government at the end of 2018 showed that nearly two billion 5p plastic bags were sold in the last financial year.This is a stark reduction from 2014, when 7.6 billion carrier bags – the equivalent of 140 per person – were handed out solely by England’s seven largest supermarkets.
The end of the throwaway culture
At the end of 2018 it emerged that the original 5p charge on thin carrier bags would double to 10p as part of the Government’s plan to end Britain’s “throwaway culture” by 2020.
An estimated 3.6 billion single-use bags are supplied free each year by England’s 250,000 small retailers. Under the new rules – that will come into force in 2020 – smaller shops will no longer be exempt from the charge.
On average, music festivals generate 23,500 tonnes of waste, including plastic bottles, food containers, food waste, clothing and abandoned tents.
This year, Michael and Emily Eavis made the historic decision to make Glastonbury Festival 2019 plastic-free.
“We feel that the public very much bought into our campaign to reduce, reuse and recycle and we’re very pleased with the results,” a spokesperson said.
One of the highlights of the festival was the appearance of Sir David Attenborough praising Glastonbury’s decision to go plastic free. The highlight of his speech was the statistic “more than one million plastic bottles will have been saved by the over 200,000 festival attendees”.
Biodegradable confetti was used in performances at this year’s event, including the shows by Years And Years and Kylie Minogue, with roughly 40% of festival-goers traveling to Glastonbury also using public transport a big push has been made to make Glastonbury as energy efficient as possible.
How successful was Glastonbury’s plastic-free commitment?
Despite Glastonbury’s commitment to reducing plastic waste, this did not stop attendees bringing plastic with them and leaving it abandoned across Worthy Farm. People still bringing in throwaway plastic bottles clandestinely, as well as single-use camping chairs that were bound to be left behind. 1,300 volunteers are currently 90% completed the long clean-up operation to deal with all the leftover camping chairs, plastic bottles, blow-up mattresses, flip flops and cool boxes.
Unfortunately, it also emerged that the onsite Co-op sold items in non-recyclable packaging too, which was not in sync with the rest of the festival’s ethos. Most memorably, Co-op’s bags of ice were non-recyclable which were popular as temperatures soared to 28C.
Glastonbury is certainly leading the way in banning plastic from large scale events, but we still have a long way to go if attendees are going to commit to an anti-plastic frame of mind. As we saw with Co-op, brands and sponsors have to commit too for the impact we need to shape the future of music festivals.
If you’re a business looking for help with your summer event waste management, don’t hesitate to get in touch with North West Waste to learn more about what we do.
