Government Business

With the UK public sector procuring more than £26 billion worth of construction work each year it is ultimately responsible for around one third of the industry’s annual output.
    
When the Government’s Strategy for Sustainable Construction was launched in June, its focus in providing a blueprint for the future of the industry fell into several key areas. Design quality, skills and climate change mitigation are among the issues that have been highlighted with a series of overarching targets being set.

Reducing landfill
Decreasing the amount of construction waste being sent to landfill is a significant part of the new Strategy, with the industry now being called on to reduce, by half, the amount of construction, demolition and excavation waste it sends to landfill by 2012.
    
Public sector clients clearly have a key role to play in meeting this target – a fact that has already been recognised by the industry. John Spanswick, the chairman of the Major Contractors Group (MCG) - whose members carry out more than £20 billion worth of construction work each year - has been reported as identifying a firm lead from the public sector as being the key to the overall success of the Strategy.
    
How can construction clients in the public sector make the most of their influential position and take a lead in reducing the amount of construction waste being sent to landfill?
    
It is at the earliest stages of the supply chain process when the most significant opportunities exist. By setting in place contractual requirements in relation to the way construction waste is reduced and managed, or the levels of recycled content that must be achieved; the public sector can be a driving force behind changing the way the industry works.

Measuring tool
You cannot, however, manage what you do not measure and WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) has recently launched a new online tool that provides project teams with a user-friendly way of forecasting the amounts and types of waste that will be generated across just one or a whole portfolio of construction projects.
    
Designed as a secure online facility, the Net Waste Tool can be used on new build, refurbishment and infrastructure projects. It enables the user (e.g. the project QS) to enter information relating to project size, programme and the materials to be used. The tool will then forecast likely waste arisings, identify the key opportunities to reduce that waste and advise on skip strategies to recover more of the remainder. All data is stored online so those involved with project delivery can easily share it.
    
The tool estimates the value of materials that will be wasted and the costs of waste disposal, enabling business decisions on remedial action. It also quantifies the environmental impacts, including tonnes of waste and potential carbon savings.
    
Finally, it is important to note that the tool also estimates the likely amount of waste going to landfill, which will be crucial in measuring progress towards the Strategy for Sustainable Construction target of halving waste to landfill by 2012. To further support the delivery of this target across the construction sector, WRAP is set to launch, in the autumn of 2008, a voluntary approach that will unite the industry in working towards this common objective. WRAP will be asking construction clients and contractors - including those in the public sector - to embed targets in their corporate policies and procurement processes, and to monitor and report on their progress.
    
The use of the tool therefore provides construction clients in the public sector with a standard assessment and reporting method, which can in turn be used to generate sound corporate benchmarks for the rest of the supply chain to work towards. The outputs from the Net Waste Tool can then be incorporated into Site Waste Management Plans – another area in which WRAP provides bespoke support and guidance.
    
Achieving reductions in the amount of waste being sent to landfill is a challenge that now needs to be embraced by the industry as a whole. From clients to sub-contractors it is vital that each stage of the entire supply chain takes on board the role it can play. Clients within the public sector are certainly in a powerful and unique position to kick-start the process of securing permanent behavioural change and reducing costs in this very important area.

Bovis Lend Lease, Pendle Vale School 
WRAP’s Net Waste metric can be used to assess the balance between the value of materials wasted and the value of recovered material used on a project. Bovis Lend Lease (Bovis) applied the metric as part of its work on the £20m Pendle Vale School project in Lancashire.
   
Bovis was working to a target of producing less than 10m3 of waste per £100,000 of project value, and also looking for cost-neutral opportunities to reuse materials and increase recycled content.
   
The Net Waste analysis revealed that building products worth around 2.8 per cent of the total cost of the materials were likely to be thrown away – with the main three sources of waste by value being identified as the mechanical and electrical installations, concrete and the roads and parking areas.
   
Increasing the use of recovered materials took the project beyond standard practice. By using recycled aggregates in the creation of the roads and parking areas, Bovis was able to substitute £100,000 of virgin material. Similarly, the reuse of materials on site such as plasterboard, bricks, blocks, decking and crushed stone amounted to a saving of £25,000 derived from waste reduction and avoiding the purchase of new materials. Finally, the materials recovered when the existing building is demolished at the end of the project will be assessed for reuse.
   
The actions taken by Bovis as a result of the analysis enabled them to reduce the Net Waste (i.e. waste generated minus the use of recovered material) by almost one third. The project is due for completion in the third quarter of 2008.

For more information  
The Net Waste Tool is freely accessible from the WRAP website – www.wrap.org.uk/nwtool