Putting our Environmental Policy into Practice

Rather than just comply with the requirements of ISO 14001, STI established its Green Team to implement relevant initiatives in support of a cleaner environment.


The Green Team has now been active since 2008 and has implemented many new initiatives. These are now visible across all sites, and we welcome the opportunity of discussing the benefits of these initiatives with you.

Initially The Carbon Trust carried out a site survey. This gave us a good base to work form, and highlighted potential areas for improvement.

Since then the Green Team has been educating staff and has tackled many waste streams with significant financial benefits. A few of the recent energy and material saving initiative are detailed below.

Dyson Airblade™ Hand Dryer

The amount of paper towels that were being consumed by STI was huge. As well as sending all that waste paper to landfill, it was costing a fortune too. The Green Team looked at the alternatives and found that the Dyson Airblade™ hand dryer was the market leader in terms of technology, cost savings and the environment.

The Dyson Airblade™ hand dryer dries 19 pairs of hands for the price of a single paper towel, works in just 10 seconds and uses up to 80% less energy than a standard warm air hand dryer. Payback on the dryers can be achieved in just 11 months making them a sound financial investment.

Recycling Initiatives
Previously STI did not recycle; all waste was sent to landfill at a high cost to the environment and to our business. With landfill taxes set to rise further urgent action was required. In collaboration with a specialist waste recycling company we have achieved a cost reduction of over 50% - this is the greatest saving reached so far.

The Green Team has a representative in each area to advise and answer questions that arise. This has been very effective in encouraging and enforcing the change. We are now recycling 75% of our waste. Subsequent in-house initiatives include switching all paper to 100 % recycled; saving our milk bottle tops for charity and replacing our plastic water cups (using 25,000 over 8 months) for 100% recycled paper cone cups.

Turn It Off
To conserve energy further, we have implemented a “turn it off policy”. Our target is to decrease our energy consumption over the next year by at least 15%. Areas are monitored for their usage and energy saving methods are evaluated and then implemented.

To discuss our latest environmental initiatives and perhaps how you can take similar steps in your business, please do not hesitate to contact us.