Skanem Liverpool goes green

Skanem Liverpool has recently completed an environmental project focused around the disposal of waste products from its manufacturing process. A new bailing system has been installed at site and the return and re-use of all ink, varnish and chemistry containers has also been introduced, both internally and with supply partners.

Site managing director Steve Dunne said: ‘With the increasing focus on the environment in our day to day life and the spiraling costs for disposal of waste materials through landfill, it was critical that we reviewed our processes in this area. This is a problem we all face in our daily lives and it is becoming key in any manufacturing business.

‘In the next 12 month period we had forecast a disposed waste figure of approximately 1,000 tonnes from our operation. The majority of this was laminate which was compacted and then taken away for landfill. With the investments in equipment increasing our operational capacity and the uptake we have in now operating on a 24 hours per day, seven days a week basis, it became a key consideration as we would have to have emptied the compactor on a daily basis to deal with this increased tonnage.’

100 percent of Skanem Liverpool’s matrix waste is now removed direct from the presses and bailed. It is then loaded onto a transport sledge and removed free of cost from the site by recycling partners. This waste is then converted into plastic formed end user items for the building and agricultural sectors.

Dunne added: ‘The success of this project can now be clearly seen in the reduction of compactor collections to one per week from the previous three. It has now become a real blueprint for the rest of the group to follow in going green for ours and our children's future.’