Despite the rise in recycling habits among Australian households, businesses lag. With 27% of waste ending up in landfills, commercial waste contributes significantly to environmental damage.
The government’s Business Recycling Program and commercial rubbish removal services in Sydney can help businesses mitigate this issue. These programs provide the necessary tools and knowledge to effectively reduce, reuse, and recycle waste. These initiatives have led to a 76% recycling rate, particularly in the construction sector. Let’s look at how these programs are helping businesses reduce waste.
Environmental Benefits of Commercial Recycling Programs
Companies that practice the “3 R’s” contribute to the following environmental benefits:
Reduction of Carbon Footprint
One of the most important aspects of commercial recycling programs and proper rubbish removal in Sydney is the reduction of a company’s overall carbon footprint. As an estimate, construction companies contribute roughly 30 to 50 million tonnes to Australia’s carbon footprint (CF) annually. By choosing to participate more enthusiastically (with policy changes) in a Business Recycling Program, companies could reduce their overall carbon footprint.
Reducing Landfill Waste
Another important recycling aspect is reducing waste at any of Sydney’s three landfills. By choosing to recycle raw products – such as wood – companies can greatly reduce the amount of waste in a landfill. Construction and demolition companies accounted for 45% of Australia’s ‘core waste’. However, recycling and Sydney rubbish removal companies could recycle more than 50% of that waste.
By recycling things like wood, bricks, glass, insulation and certain plastics, companies can greatly reduce landfill waste.
Conserving Natural Resources
As we all know, Australia’s natural resources are under threat. Between wildfires that ravaged the country and destroyed 18 million hectares of bush in 2019-2020 and man-made destruction, it’s more important than ever that businesses become more conscious of conserving our national natural resources.
The more companies that use the Business Recycling Program can reduce their waste, reuse what they can and recycle the rest, the less raw materials we’ll have to take from the land. This principle will help create a more stable circular economy.
Resource Recovery & The Circular Economy
Resource recovery is the process that waste undergoes to recycle- essentially taking a waste product and turning it into something useful – thereby recovering that waste product and harnessing it to create new resources. These resources are often extracted from wastewater, sewage slurry, fecal matter and human excreta. A good example of resource recovery is using cow and sheep manure on garden beds to improve soil health and grow more flowers or food.
Many micro-nutrients like sulphur, nitrogen and potassium exist within the above-mentioned examples and if those can be extracted through resource recovery processes, achieving a 90% diversion rate from landfills.
Cost Savings & Economic Benefits
As a business, one of your purposes has to be to turn a profit. By participating in a business recycling program, you’ll see how much money not using proper rubbish removal services costs your business annually and how much money you might save by participating in a Business Recycling Program.
As a snapshot, the mining industry produced 620 million tonnes of waste in 2020-2021, most of that was slurry made from pulverised rock and water. How much of that waste cost to mining businesses could have been saved by treating their waste differently?
Using commercial recycling programs, your landfill levies and waste disposal fees could drop significantly, saving your company hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars annually.
Apart from cost-saving, your business could profit from selling recycled materials. Depending on your business structure, this may be easier said than done, but it is certainly possible.
Streamlining a waste management system by introducing recycling and reusing options into your company’s waste management could improve your operating efficiency. Rather than having to call up a rubbish removal company, wait for them to have an available vehicle, and wait for them to come and collect the waste and then pay their disposal fees.
Having a recycling plan in place could mean increasing your efficiency by introducing ongoing recycling processes into your business workflow.
Compliance with Regulations and Corporate Social Responsibility
As a business, you have a specific set of legal requirements to meet regarding environmental regulations – these include federal, state and municipal regulations on waste management. These include waste reduction targets and periodically checking (and adhering to) waste management rules in your state. Not only are you legally bound to adhere to environmental regulations, but you have a moral and ethical obligation to adopt a Corporate Social Responsibility doctrine as a business.
Tailoring Recycling Programs to Business Needs
One of the great things about Commercial Recycling Programs is that they can be tailored to the needs of your specific business. Coming up with a recycling program that works for your company requires forming a plan that specifies what you’re going to be recycling, how it will be recycled or reused and when the collection of recycled materials will occur.
Sydney rubbish removal services can be requested on specific days of the week for specific recycled items (or a bulk collection of many recyclable items). For example, suppose you’re a home appliance maker. In that case, you’ll find that you have a lot of metal waste – this can be recycled – you’ll need to create a plan for recycling this material and contact Cheapest Load of Rubbish, your local rubbish removal company in Sydney to find out how we can help.
Alongside tailoring recycling programs to your business needs, planning and executing these programs successfully requires waste audits and team meetings about recycling and your company’s recycling goals, along with clear objectives and reinforcement of the positives of being environmentally conscious on a company scale.
Periodic waste audits can be done in partnership with waste collection providers. These periodic audits will ensure that you’re not missing opportunities to recycle waste products and that you’re meeting company waste management targets.
Once you have these programs in place, you must inform and educate your employees about the programs to encourage recycling and ensure the three R’s stay fresh in mind as they go through the workday.
Collaboration with Recycling Service Providers
It’s important that you build positive relationships with Sydney’s rubbish removal services, as you’ll need to find one that works best for your business model and could be hugely beneficial, should your collection needs change over time.
When it comes to choosing what provider is right for your waste collection needs, it’s important that you do your research thoroughly and consider the following factors:
- Does the company provide the services I’m looking for?
Choosing an all-inclusive Sydney rubbish removal service (if that’s what you need for your business model) is far better than paying for and working with different service providers. Find one that does it all! - Choose Certified Experts
All rubbish removal in Sydney must be done by certified Sydney rubbish removal experts – these are nationally-recognised and accredited companies. Check that the company you’re using falls within these guidelines. Cheapest Load of Rubbish is one of your best options for rubbish removal companies in Sydney.
Measurement And Monitoring
Finally, while you can encourage fun and games in the office to jog people’s memories about the importance of recycling, you should also track your company’s progress in changing its ways. As a part of this progress-tracking, define your areas for improvement – in conjunction with advice from Cheapest Load of Rubbish, Sydney’s rubbish removal specialist. This will help you see where you’re falling short.
Finally, take note of what success looks like. You can use a few different metrics to measure your success in your commercial recycling program. Keeping track of how you’re doing as a company will help you move forward and explore either new ways to recycle more products or how to reuse certain products differently to make a profit and save the planet at the same time.
