Integrated systems for practical

recovery of non-MSW waste streams Project No WR0205

Project leader:

Dr Paul Dacombe (SU)

Researchers:

Dr Christine Thomas (OU), Dr Mark Yoxon (OU), Ms Angela

Maycox (SU), Mr Talat Khan (SU), Professor Charles Banks

(SU)

2

Executive summary

This research was carried out by University of Southampton and The Open University

with further support and advice from Hampshire County Council. It has involved

developing a computer web-based self assessment tool for the identification and

quantification of non-MSW waste streams to provide on-line information for matching

locally-based waste / recycling services. The application of this tool could provide the

information necessary to waste managers to facilitate recovery from individual companies

and assist in the collection of data needed for the planning of integrated facilities by the

commercial, public and voluntary sectors. This work continues an earlier project on

‘Identification of Key Resources Streams in Commercial and Industrial Waste from Small

Businesses in the Food Sector’ the results of which were published by Thomas et al.,

(2007).

The tool is based on gathering data through an 'on-line' questionnaire that was developed

according to an expert-system approach with both rule-based and hierarchical

programming, and contains in-built databases to categorise businesses within a SIC code

classification and waste on a key resource stream basis (a 'smart questionnaire'). A key

feature of the approach is the ability to limit the questions asked to those relevant to the

company being audited, thus saving time and avoiding ‘customer annoyance. A variety of

techniques including photos, prompts, selective lists and pop-up information boxes are

used to obtain more accurate information on waste generation. These are employed

throughout to assist in completing the questionnaire in the minimum time and with the

greatest accuracy. The use of in-built databases offers the potential for direct feedback to

the company on its environmental performance and ways in which this could be improved

based on local knowledge of recovery options for material resources.

Six main areas are interrogated by the questionnaire: business details, waste routes and

disposal methods used by the business, containers used, types and amounts of waste

generated by the business, occasional wastes produced, and waste awareness. The

compositional categories used in the audit focus on identifying the key resource streams

using a cascading structure based on twelve main resource streams; further subdivided

into 25 main waste categories and 59 more specific sub-categories, allowing entry of data

to the level of detail available within this hierarchy

The current research has:

1. Developed the ‘smart questionnaire’ to a point where it can be used interactively

by waste producers to provide them with audit data and pass to them information on

locally available recycling facilities. At the same time the programme gathers this

information for the waste manager.

2. Developed promotional material for use with the questionnaire.

3. Explored business perceptions of waste-related activities and how the business

community can be more fully engaged in resource recovery activities.

4. Developed ways in which ‘self assessment’ data can be reliably collected.

5. Established a platform on which audit results and information gained could be

used for developing a resource recovery strategy at a local level through integration of

service provision and planning.

3

The report describes how the questionnaire has been structured to gather information

across the breadth of the business sector and to provide feedback to individual businesses

on how to maximise their waste management opportunities. Examples are shown of the

GIS mapping system and how this gives location information and services offered. The

structure of the administrator interface, which allows the waste manager user to customize

the questionnaire to his or her own geographical region, is described and illustrates a

potential mechanism by which the audit tool could be rolled out.

Details are given of a small survey carried out on businesses in the construction sector

which was used to test the methodology, using face-to-face interviews to record

difficulties in the use of the questionnaire by the interviewees. The results of the survey

were analysed primarily in relation to data obtained for the specific SIC code groups and

types of businesses surveyed, exploring the accuracy of assumptions about average or

typical waste arisings for these business types. To engage with the wider business

community three workshops were run where businesses were asked to comment on their

experience of using the questionnaire and concerns about waste issues as they affect their

business activities. The findings from these workshops have provided some insight into

the attitudes held by SMEs on recycling. Many of these focused on the barriers they face

and how these may be tackled, but the workshops also highlighted some positive attitudes

and perceived opportunities.

4

CONTENTS

1. Introduction 1.1. Overview

1.2. Background to the research

2. Report structure

3. Context of the current research

4. Review of literature on the resource potential of C&I wastes from

SMEs 4.1. Literature review

4.2. Resource classification

5. Methodological approach used in the research 5.1 Restructuring of the ‘smart questionnaire’

5.2 Development of a GIS

5.3 Selection of defined areas (sectors)

5.4 User surveys.

5.5. Exploring how to engage businesses

5.6. Analyse data to identify practical location-specific resource recovery strategies.

5.7 Prepare a blueprint for rolling out the smart questionnaire for use in other

locations.

6. Questionnaire design 6.1 Business details

6.1.1 Business description

6.2 Waste removal or disposal options

6.3 Waste composition section

6.4 Bin-filling section

6.5 Occasional waste section

6.6 Waste awareness section

6.7 Feedback section

6.7.1 Pie Chart

6.7.2 Feedback report

6.8 Mapping section

7. Customising the questionnaire for different geographical locations

and user groups 7.1 Item lists

7.1.1 Business activity search words

7.1.2 Waste containers

7.1.2.1 Adding a waste container

7.1.2.2 Changing the container volume

7.2 Regional information

7.2.1 Editing a local authority

7.2.2 Private waste/recycling companies

5

7.3 Bin registration

7.4 Design waste page

7.5 Waste density

7.6 Feedback report

7.7 Mapping

8. Survey of SMEs in the C&D sector 8.1 Selection of businesses

8.2 Business responses to the survey

8.2.1 Cost and incentives

8.3. Survey Analysis and Results

8.3.1 Survey data analysis

8.4 Survey results for SMEs in the C&D sector

8.4.1 Average waste arisings for each business type

8.4.2 Variance in the data

8.4.3 Waste composition for each business type

8.4.4 Estimates of wastes from C&D sector SMEs in Hampshire

9. Business surveys on the use of the questionnaire 9.1. Workshops 1 & 2 (23 June 2006)

9.1.1 Outputs from workshops 1 & 2

9.2. Workshops 3 & 4 (01 March 2007)

9.2.1. What’s in it for me?

9.2.2. Time

9.2.3 Navigation

9.2.4 Data entry

9.2.5 Look and feel

9.3 Sub group feedback on use of the questionnaire

10. Conclusions and recommendations

11. Dissemination

12. References and sources of information 12.1 References cited in the text

12.2. Sources consulted for statistical data and business information

12.3. Other literature reviewed

13. Appendices Appendix 1: Waste Categories and Sub-categories

Appendix 2: Business details section flow sheet (including list of business sectors)

Appendix 3: Feedback Documents

Appendix 4: Example of programming to include additional business groups

Appendix 5: Programmes for workshops and focus groups

Appendix 6: Results from the first two user focus groups.

6

1. Introduction

1.1 Overview

This research was carried out by University of Southampton and The Open University

and funded by the Defra Waste and Resources Evidence Programme, with further support

and advice from Hampshire County Council. The key objective of the project was to

provide a practical audit tool to assist in the identification and quantification of non-

municipal solid waste (MSW) waste streams, focusing on commercial and industrial

(C&I) wastes from the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) sector. SMEs are defined as

businesses employing less than 250 people; with medium enterprises having 50-249

employees, small enterprises 10-49 employees and micro businesses 1-9 employees1.

The project has involved further developing the concept of a computer-based

questionnaire to the point where it can be used as a self-assessment audit tool and provide

on-line information to match locally-based waste / recycling services. The research has

concentrated on providing an interactive web-based system as a reliable method of

capturing both location and composition data of waste streams and developing this with a

method of displaying geographically-distinct information, and providing protocols for the

engagement of the SME business community at a local level. The application of this tool

could provide the information necessary to waste managers to facilitate recovery from

individual companies and in the collection of data that is needed for the planning of

integrated facilities by the commercial, public and voluntary sectors.

1 These definitions are commonly used by UK government and EU sources and are based on numbers of employees

rather than business turnover (see http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/enterprise_policy and http://www.sbs.gov.uk)

1.2 Background

This research project continues on from earlier work funded by Veolia Environmental

Trust through the Landfill Tax Credit Scheme and through the EPSRC’s Sustainable

Urban Environment (SUE) programme, with additional support from Hampshire County

Council and South East England Development Agency (SEEDA). That research is

described fully in the report ‘Identification of Key Resources Streams in Commercial and

Industrial Waste from Small Businesses in the Food Sector’ (Thomas et al, 2007). Much

of the background research for that project is contextually relevant to this project and

consequently extracts from the previous report have been included to ensure a more

complete understanding of the development of the methodology and context of this work.

In the previous research project, a methodology was developed to obtain information in

improved detail on waste generation and its resource composition from a selection of

Hampshire based SMEs focusing on food production, food retailing and food service

sectors. This research complemented the previous large-scale EA surveys and created the

basic framework for a computer-based interactive waste auditing tool ('smart

questionnaire') for use in data collection. The questionnaire was designed so that it could

be expanded through the in-built databases to cover the full commercial spectrum as

defined by Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codings and waste categories. It was

structured to provide data on key resource stream categories and integration with the EU

waste catalogue. The questionnaire was designed to be delivered face-to-face by

interviewers and used simple questions which are tiered to seek information regarding the

company's activities and waste load, with the ability to internal error trap to check data

7

reliability. It was also designed to seek the same information using alternative approaches

to allow cross-checking of answers against one another. The smart questionnaire was

developed based on an expert-system approach with both rule-based and hierarchical

programming. A further key feature of the smart questionnaire is its ability to limit the

questions asked to those relevant to the company being audited, thus saving time and

avoiding ‘customer annoyance’. The use of in-built databases also offers the potential for

direct feedback to the company on its environmental performance and ways in which this

could be improved based on local knowledge of recovery options for material resources.

The approach thus satisfies one of the prime criteria essential in enlisting the support of

businesses, by meeting the demands of the "what’s in it for me?" syndrome.

The interviewer based questionnaire developed in the earlier project was used to conduct

a case study waste audit in Hampshire on 170 businesses, sampled across nine food sector

business types (manufacturing, wholesale, non-specialist retail, specialist retail, hotels,

guest houses, restaurants, bars and catering) and 3 size groups (micro, small and medium)

from the database of over 5000 SMEs. The survey yielded 151 usable samples. In terms

of usability and business response, the questionnaire performed well, with no major

problems arising with completing the questions. In over half of the cases it was

successfully completed in the design time of 20-30 minutes.

The survey also demonstrated that using an exploratory approach in the structure of the

questioning, and asking about wastes in several different ways, provided an extremely

useful way to gain more information from interviewees. This allowed them to expand

their initially narrowly-focused concept of waste, which was usually of the materials

entering the main disposal bins, to other routes and materials. It was found that as

questioning progressed they would often remember or recognise other materials as

wastes, prompted by the way the questionnaire was designed. This illustrated the ability

of the questionnaire design to enable more detailed information to be collected on all the

wastes disposed, reused and recycled by the SMEs surveyed. This was particularly

noticed in the survey for those wastes dealt with by options other than the main local

authority or waste management company contractor and which might be missed by more

conventional questionnaire designs.

The current research thus builds upon and develops this previous work and the concept of

a ‘smart questionnaire’ in the following key ways:

1. Restructuring the ‘smart questionnaire’ into a web-based, on line format that can

be used interactively by waste producers as a self-assessment tool and facilities

locator, whilst at the same time gathering audit data.

2. Using the 'smart questionnaire' in both web-based format and as a stand-alone

promotional CD to carry out a survey of the full spectrum of waste materials in

specific geographical areas.

3. Explore business perceptions of waste-related activities, to underpin the

development and evaluation of methods by which the business community can be

more fully engaged in resource recovery activities.

4. Developing ways in which ‘self assessment’ can be used to expand and refine the

knowledge base on types and quantities of wastes generated across a range of

SME business types, and allowing assessment of the reliability of data collected in

this way

8

5. Establishing a platform on which audit results and information gained can be used

for developing a resource recovery strategy at a local level through integration of

service provision and planning.

The concept behind the computer-based interactive waste auditing tool ('smart

questionnaire'), however, remains the same in that it allows the interrogation of a series of

embedded databases to provide appropriate option selection and minimise false entries.

The smart questionnaire, which has been called ‘WASTE QUEST’, is constructed using

an expert-system approach with both rule-based and hierarchical programming. It uses a

simple tiered questioning approach which adapts the questions asked according to the

user’s responses, thus avoiding irrelevant and confusing information. Problems such as

the units in which waste is quantified are overcome by using internal conversion factors,

thus allowing the respondent to specify quantities in terms with which he/she is familiar.

The questionnaire also makes use of visual techniques to obtain more accurate

information on waste generation and to overcome some of the problems encountered in

earlier research on the conversion of volumetric to weight-based data. Weight is an

important criterion as existing data from collection rounds and other services is recorded

in this manner, and the accuracy of information can be checked by a simple mass balance

approach. A variety of techniques including photos, prompts, selective lists and popup

information boxes are used to obtain more accurate information on waste generation.

These are employed throughout to assist in completing the questionnaire in the minimum

time and with the greatest accuracy.

There are, as described in more detail in Chapter 6, six main areas interrogated by the

questionnaire: business details, waste routes and disposal methods used by the business,

the containers used, the types and amounts of waste generated by the business, occasional

wastes produced and waste awareness.

Information about the amounts and types of waste produced by the business is gained by

questions asking about:

• wastes that arise on a regular basis and those that occur only occasionally such as

from maintenance work;

• containers used to store wastes prior to their collection for disposal or recycling;

• routes by which waste leave their premises, including the main disposal route and

any recycling or back hauling.

• frequency that waste is collected or taken away;

• container fullness;

• what materials types are disposed of by the business, from detailed resource lists;

• estimates of how much of each type of material goes into each container.

A key aspect of this and previous research has been in identifying the potential for

improved recovery and recycling. It is based on the principle that effective resource

recovery from the waste produced by society should not discriminate between different

sources of waste materials, hence, the compositional categories used in the audit focus on

identifying the key resource streams using a cascading structure based on twelve main

resource streams; subdivided into 25 main waste categories and further into 59 more

specific sub-categories. The questionnaire is designed to record waste composition

information at as detailed a level as available; hence if the respondent can only provide

estimates of what materials are in their waste stream at the 12 main category level then

9

this is recorded and is sufficient to provide the tailored feedback at the end of the

questionnaire. If however more detailed information is available then this is also recorded

and can be used in the feedback and data analysis.

10

2. Report structure

The project has comprised a number of stages, which are described in detail in the

following sections. The first phase is summarised in section 3 which puts forward the

context in which the research has been undertaken and this is followed in section 4 by a

literature review and the rationale used to inform and develop the resource classification

that has been used in this and previous research on the composition of C&I waste.

The objective based methodologies used in the research are described in section 5 and the

further development of the ‘smart’ interactive questionnaire to a web based tool is

covered in section 6. This describes how the questionnaire has been structured to gather

information across the breadth of the business sector and feedback to individual

businesses on how to maximise their waste management opportunities. The latter aspect

has always been considered important in the success of delivering a survey as this is

critically dependent on cooperation offered by the business community. To maximise

this, the web based tool has been constructed to offer tangible benefits through feedback,

information services and links to further waste related information. The approach has

been further developed to provide a resource map using a GIS mapping system which is

built into the databases of the questionnaire. Section 7 looks at the way in which a waste

manager user interface to the questionnaire has been developed. This interface allows the

databases within the questionnaire to be edited or augmented simply and without the need

of any computer programming skills. The interface allows the user to customize the

questionnaire to their own geographical region and provides a mechanism by which the

audit tool could be rolled out.

Section 8 describes the survey carried out on businesses in the construction sector. The

main aim of carrying out this case study survey was to test the methodology with the

minimum intervention of interviewers, both in terms of usability and the level of detail

obtained in assessing waste arisings from these businesses, particularly those smaller

businesses where there is a paucity of accurate data. The survey was carried out face-to-

face but not using waste management professionals as the interviewers, but simply using

personnel to present the questionnaire, its aims and objectives and to record difficulties in

its use by the interviewees. The results were analysed primarily in relation to data

obtained for the specific SIC code groups and types of businesses surveyed, exploring the

accuracy of assumptions about average or typical waste arisings for these business types.

in the construction sector. To engage with the wider business community three workshops

were run where businesses were asked to comment on their experience of both using the

questionnaire and concerns about waste issues as they affect their business activities.

Section 9 summarises the key issues that arose from these comments, and provides some

insight into the attitudes held by these SMEs on recycling. Many of these focused on the

barriers they face and how these may be tackled, but also highlighted some positive

attitudes and perceived opportunities.

11

3. Context of the research The context in which this research has been undertaken is that of the current

understanding of the C&I waste sector and in particular those wastes from SMEs.

Hampshire was used as a case study area for testing the questionnaire, and in Hampshire,

as with the rest of the UK, the SME sector is the least well understood in regard to waste

generation rates, waste composition and geographical distribution of potential recoverable

resource. Hampshire's economic development database shows that over 80% of

businesses have less than 50 employees. And these businesses often have waste streams

whose components could readily be integrated into the existing collection and recovery

infrastructure; but the companies themselves are unlikely to have the capacity to pursue

such initiatives. The EA surveys developed a set of web-based tools for estimation of

waste generation rates and materials types, but the accessibility and accuracy of the data

has not allowed this to be used for strategic planning at a local level. The tools themselves

are a useful concept and if enhanced for use at this level could fulfil this role.

Further discussion of the issues relating to wastes from SMEs in the UK is presented in

Insert 1 which contains relevant extracts from the report of the earlier project (Thomas et

al, 2007).

Insert 1: C&I waste from SMEs in the UK – background context

Government figures estimate the amount of commercial and industrial (C&I) waste

generated in England in 2002/3 was just under 70 million tonnes, between 2.5 and 3 times

the amount of household waste produced in the same year (Defra, 2006). Although the

former has an overall higher record for recycling and recovery at 45% in 2002/3, the

material disposed of still represents a considerable untapped resource. In a report for the

Environment Agency in England, Cambridge Econometrics and AEA Technology

estimated that UK manufacturers throw away 7% of profits in wasted natural resources

(CE and AEAT, 2003). Municipal solid waste (MSW) and household wastes have

received considerable attention in recent years driven by EU and national policy agendas

to divert wastes from landfill and increase recovery and recycling of resources. Recently

the agenda has begun to focus more on improving the resource efficiency and

management of waste from the commercial and industrial sector, and in particular from

SMEs – the least understood sector in terms of wastes produced, its composition and

potential for minimisation, greater recovery and recycling.

Apart from the broad overview national waste surveys carried out by the Environment

Agency (EA) in 1999 and in 2002/3 in England and Wales (EA, 2000 and 2005) and by

SEPA in Scotland in 2005 (McLaurin et al, 2006 and Curry, 2005), surprisingly little

research has been carried out to obtain accurate information on the quantities, nature and

distribution of these wastes. Even less has been done towards development of an

infrastructure through which the natural resources present within them can be recovered.

One reason is that the waste management industry is relatively fragmented in this area,

with multiple operators providing services on an individual contract basis, and little

incentive offered for traders to separate their wastes.

The EA 2002/3 survey (EA, 2005) concludes that around half of the total C&I waste in

England and Wales is produced by SMEs, the other half by large companies with more

12

than 250 employees; however the split is markedly different when commercial and

industrial wastes are separated, with SMEs accounting for only 1/3 of industrial wastes

but 2/3 of commercial. The recent review of England’s waste strategy(Defra, 2006)

quotes 40% of C&I wastes as coming from SMEs but described these as companies with

less than 50 employees which are generally defined as ‘small’ businesses(with medium

sized being 50-250), showing the significance of the smallest companies in waste

production. Recycling overall is higher for industrial waste (47%) compared to

commercial (37%), and is likely to be higher for large companies than SMEs as concern

is often expressed about the lack of opportunity and infrastructure for small businesses to

engage in recycling.

The waste strategy review in England recognises ‘smaller businesses often have particular

difficulties in obtaining affordable recycling and recovery services’, and points to

improving linkages across different waste streams as a way to improve this situation: “it

is a matter of concern if we are failing to capitalise on economies of scale in the

management of different types of waste” (Defra, 2006). It refers to potential benefits from

aggregating demand (between municipal and other waste) through developing critical

mass to procure services, build economically scaled facilities, and a better price for

supply of greater volumes of recycled materials to the market. The review also comments

that stakeholders pointed out that small businesses face particular difficulties because

they do not have sufficient incentive, influence or capacity to secure environmentally

beneficial solutions. A report commissioned by the Chartered Institution of Wastes

Management (CIWM) (SLR, 2005) found that experience in countries with better landfill

diversion records than the UK suggest that most of them have greater integration of the

management of different waste streams. They concluded that the integration of strategic

planning for municipal and industrial wastes played a key role in higher recycling levels.

Another important aspect here concerns attitudes and behaviour. In research about public

attitudes to recycling and promoting sustainable behaviours the link between recycling in

the workplace as well as in the home has been cited in the context of ‘normalising’

recycling behaviour and encouraging more people to recycle as a habit (Thomas, 2004).

Engaging SMEs in waste reduction and recycling issues could hence help promote and

achieve behavioural change beyond the workplace.

Local authorities could potentially play a significant role in this; they already collect

some commercial waste from small businesses such as shops, small trading estates,

council offices and local parks and gardens, but this accounted for only 3.7 million tonnes

in 2002/3, around10% of waste generated by SMEs. They are though the most likely

source of information, especially for the smallest companies; a survey by NetRegs (EA,

2005) found that 61% of SMEs would ask their local authority for guidance on

environmental issues and in securing recycling services. It is clear that awareness

amongst small businesses of waste regulations is low with the Waste Management

Licensing Regulations recognised by only 35% and Duty of Care Regulations by 32% of

SMEs (EA, 2005); and the penetration of initiatives to help them manage resources more

sustainably such as BREW, Envirowise and NetRegs is also poor amongst small

businesses (CE and AEAT, 2003; EA, 2002 and WS Atkins, 2003).

The strategy review discusses the type of role that local authorities could take on

including strategic planning, providing information and advice, or providing recycling

services through collection or CA sites. Similarities in the potential resources in wastes

13

from small businesses and MSW suggest co-collection and processing opportunities, but

more information on the SME waste stream is needed for this to be realised. A survey of

retail businesses in Cardiff city centre carried out in 2002/3 concluded that waste types

from retail sector are not dissimilar to municipal waste, but that the quantities are much

larger (Frater, 2004). Some authorities are already moving in this direction; including

Hampshire’s Material Resources Strategy consultation (HCC, 2005) and the publication

by the Local Government Association (LGA, 2005) of examples of initiatives. However

much more needs to be done, especially by Government if they are to be enabled to take

further action.

Any initiative to increase recovery and recycling of resources from C&I waste needs

good reliable data on the amounts and composition of those waste streams. This research

programme was designed as a step towards providing that data through the development

of an effective methodology for gathering statistically reliable data on C&I wastes, in

particular those produced by smaller companies and sub-units of larger organisations.

Generalised questionnaires for waste auditing have not captured sufficiently accurate

data, especially in the SME sector. With better data local strategies for recovery of C&I

wastes can be rationalised and rethought to make best use of the existing infrastructure,

determine the need for additional facilities, and open up communication routes between

business and local authorities to allow business to participate in the most cost-effective

way. In a discussion paper on moving from waste to resource management, the authors

suggested that ‘a smart resource management approach integrates the processing of

household, commercial and industrial wastes to the benefit of both the council taxpayers

and of commerce and industry. This requires a new mindset of categorising waste by

resource type linked to optimum processing requirements, rather than by origin as

happens now’ (Lisney et al, 2003)

14

4. Review of literature on the resource potential of C&I

waste from SMEs

4.1 Literature review

The focus of this research was to further develop a methodology for auditing C&I wastes

from SMEs and to expand this methodology from the food related sector activities to a

more general commercial and industrial base. The literature reviewed in the earlier work

was revisited in this context and updated to account for any subsequent developments.

The areas covered in the review included previous waste audit studies of C&I waste;

resource / waste classifications for assessing waste composition; questionnaire designs

used in previous audits; SME recycling and waste minimisation studies; business profile

studies and information on SMEs; and survey and sampling techniques.

Relatively few waste audit studies of commercial and industrial sectors were available

and very little specific to SMEs. The most comprehensive research was that carried out

by The Environment Agency (EA) and the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency

(SEPA), both of which provided useful background and comparative data for this and our

previous research. The EA surveys of England and Wales were carried out in 1999 and

2002/3 (EA, 2000 and 2005); the latter involving Brass (Business Relationships,

Accountability, Sustainability and Society Centre) at Cardiff University in carrying out

the Welsh survey (BRASS, 2005). The SEPA audit was based on a pilot survey carried

out in 2004 (Curry, 2005) and then further analysed to produce estimates for Scotland

(McLaurin et al, 2006).

Other C&I waste audits studies reviewed included surveys carried out in the West

Midlands, Surrey, Oxfordshire, Andover, Staffordshire and the Yorkshire and Humber

region (MEL, 1993 + 1999; Oxfordshire CC, 2005; Padelopoulos, 2003; Whittaker, 2004;

SWAP, 2005). Questionnaires used by some of these studies were examined in the

formulation of the questionnaire developed as part of the previous research to see what

lessons could be learnt in developing the types of questions asked. These included

questionnaire used in the EA industrial and commercial waste surveys 1999 and 2002/3;

the BRASS Welsh commercial and industrial waste survey 2003; Oxfordshire County

Council’s business waste survey 2005; WAMTEC (University of Sheffield) SME waste

audits; and Hampshire County Council’s business recycling at Household Waste

Recycling Centres (HWRCs) trial survey 2003. These questionnaires were all paper based

and, although useful background information, they were mostly not entirely suited to the

type of questioning needed for an interactive computer based questionnaire.

4.2 Resource classification

A waste survey is a tool, and must be set in context of relevant aims and objectives. A key

aspect of this and previous research was in identifying the potential for improved

recovery and recycling, and hence it was important that the compositional categories used

in the audit focused on identifying the key resource streams. Identifying key resource

streams for SMEs requires a waste classification system that satisfies these criteria:

• focuses on the key resource streams for recycling (need enough information to

identify whether material can be recycled);

• focuses on the main categories of waste arisings from SME’s;

15

• is compatible with classifications used for MSW and household waste

compositions;

• is compatible as far as feasible with European Waste Classification (EWC) for

comparability with EA survey, and other waste data being recorded.

The classification developed for the previous project was used in this research, and the

rationale for the approach taken is fully described in Insert 2. Prior to developing the full

classification for the audit questionnaire, research was undertaken which involved

collating existing data on C&I wastes and classifications used, as well as classifications

for household waste and MSW. The full resource based waste classification developed in

the previous research for C&I waste needed to be compatible with classifications for

MSW if opportunities for combined collections and infrastructure were to be explored as

an outcome of this research.

Insert 2: Development of resource classification

The categories for the key resource streams for the classification were developed initially

from that outlined in Lisney et al (2003). These were derived from previous

classifications and criteria developed by the Zero Waste movement for the 12 master

categories of recyclable materials (Knapp, 1999 and Murray, 2002). These key resource

streams are shown in Table 4.1.

Key resource streams

Organic Furniture, furnishings & non-electrical office equipment Wood Electrical & electronic equipment / WEEE Paper and card Chemicals and potentially hazardous Textiles Glass and ceramics Plastics Construction and demolition Metals

Table 4.1: Key Resource Streams

The main C&I waste classifications that were reviewed included those used in the EA

1999 and 2002/3 C&I surveys, SEPA’s recent C&I survey in Scotland and the MEL and

Viridis studies (EA, 2005, Hunter, 2001, Brass, 2005, Curry R, 2005, MEL, 1999 and

Whittaker, 2004). For compatibility with MSW classifications the research compared

those cited in Defra’s waste composition analysis guidance (Defra, 2004); that proposed

in the WRAP report to the Strategy Unit’s report ‘Waste not, want not’ (Parfitt, 2002);

those used in the Welsh Assembly survey (AEAT, 2003) and by SEPA in Scotland; as

well as the classification used in the last Hampshire waste analysis survey (PI, 1999).

The review took into account the purpose of different surveys which influence the

classification that is most appropriate. The classification used in the National Household

Waste Analysis Project (NHWAP) (DOE, 1994), as well as several local authority

surveys was originally developed by the Warren Spring Laboratory as an 11 category

system, and then extended into 32 categories. The original classification was developed

during the 1970s and 1980s with the main aim of determining the potential of waste as a

fuel. The larger classification was developed later to give more information on the

potential for recycling. Classification systems need to evolve to account for developments

in policy and legislation, and consequently this is no longer appropriate for providing

information on different types of compostables (kitchen waste cooked or raw), on waste

electrical and electronic equipment and hazardous household wastes.

16

The classification system developed in the WRAP paper on MSW composition for the

Strategy Unit did this by condensing some of these 32 categories (e.g. newspapers and

magazines into one category; ferrous and non-ferrous food and beverage cans and foil

into one category of metal cans and foil) and including additional categories (e.g. kitchen

waste, engine oil, wood, furniture).

The system used in the MSW study in Wales started from a list of general descriptions

that led to 13 basic categories. Initially these were expanded into a 76 category

classification that was used during the pilot survey, but was found to be too detailed.

Most of the sample population had a small number of categories, and nearly half of the

categories were found in less than 10% of the samples. Using a large number of

categories runs the danger of data capture too small to run statistical analysis. Following

the pilot experience, the number of sub-categories was reduced to 37 (AEAT, 2003).

A classification was devised that was mainly based on, and compatible with, the Welsh

classification but moderated to take account for those materials likely to be more

prominent in C&I wastes and reduce the emphasis on some MSW resource components

that would be unlikely to feature in this waste stream.

With all these issues in mind, it was concluded that a cascading structure for the

classification of these wastes was needed based on twelve main resource streams, which

are sub-divided into 25 main waste categories, and further into 59 more specific sub-

categories to allow more detailed interrogation of resource types where such data was

available. The main resource and waste categories are given in Table 4.2, and the full

classification in Appendix 1.

Main resource streams Main waste categories

Organic organic food waste

organic non-food waste

other organic

Wood untreated wood

treated wood

Paper and card newspapers & magazines

other paper

card and board

Textiles textiles

Plastics dense plastic

plastic film

other plastics

Furniture, furnishings & non-electrical office equipment (not metals)

furniture, furnishings & non-electrical office equipment

Metals ferrous metal

non-ferrous metal

metal furnishings & non-electrical office equipment

Electrical & electronic equipment / WEEE electrical & electronic equipment

Chemicals and potentially hazardous chemicals

potentially hazardous

Glass and ceramics packaging glass

non-packaging glass

ceramics

Construction and demolition construction and demolition

Unclassified waste mixed general waste

other not classified above

Table 4.2: Waste Classification Scheme

17

There were some compatibility problems with the European Waste Classification (EWC)

which is process rather than material orientated, which in turn caused problems for

comparability with the EA 2002/3 survey. The EWC groupings are fairly broad and only

allow some mapping of our classifications on to the EA’s. Despite this issue it was felt

that for this project a resource-based classification was essential, and that should be the

primary aim of the data capture.

Data were captured in the survey at as detailed a level as was known to the interviewee,

but overall results on resource composition are focused on the 12 main categories, with

some further analysis at the second level of main waste categories for profiling C&I waste

composition in the audit. Information captured at the more detailed level of 59 categories

if available offers too many categories for overall levels of statistical validity given the

survey size, but provides some distinctions which may prove useful in parts of the

analysis and may provide insights into major resource recovery opportunities.

The literature reported here is relatively limited, as the main focus of the current project

was on the development of the modified software and on assessment of its usability.

There is an extensive 'grey' literature behind the questionnaire researched as part of this

project which has been used to populate the various in-built databases, for example on

waste densities. Literature reviewed and consulted during the research is listed in section

12. A more extensive in-depth literature review covering the conceptual basis on which

the project was founded can be found in the report on the food waste study which was a

forerunner to the current project (Thomas et al, 2007).

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5. Methodological approach used in the research

The current research builds upon and develops previous work in the following key ways:

• Restructuring the ‘smart questionnaire’ into a web-based format that can be used

interactively by waste producers as a self-assessment tool and facilities locator,

whilst at the same time gathering audit data.

• Using the 'smart questionnaire' in both web-based format and as a stand-alone

promotional CD to carry out a survey of the full spectrum of waste materials in

specific geographical areas.

• Explore business perceptions of waste-related activities, building on previous

research on public perception, to underpin the development and evaluation of

methods by which the business community can be more fully engaged in resource

recovery activities.

• Developing ways in which ‘self assessment’ can be used to expand and refine the

knowledge base on types and quantities of wastes generated across a range of

SME business types, and allowing assessment of the reliability of data collected in

this way

• Using audit results and information gained from the trial areas to demonstrate the

potential for resource recovery at a local level through integration of service

provision and planning.

The activities undertaken to achieve this are described in the following sections.

5.1 Restructuring of the ‘smart questionnaire’

The methodology was designed to develop the software from a size limited application

designed for use on a single computer to a more powerful web-based tool with greater

breadth and capacity. To ensure that the web based system could be used for data

acquisition as well as providing feedback on the users’ own resource efficiency and to

include locally available services that will allow effective resource recovery in place of

disposal.

This involved analysis of the existing in-built databases to determine which business

types can reliably be included, and assessing and meeting the additional data

requirements to encompass any potential independent or web-based user. The

methodology therefore included extending the range of businesses covered from food-

industry related SMEs to a broad mixture of company types and sizes. This was done

sequentially first by adapting the questionnaire to an additional business sector, namely

the construction industry, in order to test the mechanism of data acquisition and the

adequacy of the existing databases to meet this change. This was an iterative process,

using the information and experience gained from working with companies in the

construction sector to refine the questionnaire to meet this need. The approach, however,

proved less fruitful than was hoped and to cover a wider range of businesses using this

‘piecemeal’ approach would lead to an unstructured and difficult to manage software

package. The methodology adopted to reach the ‘final product’ therefore used a more

holistic approach which has involved restructuring the entire software package and re-

programming it to meet the perceived need. The package is now presented in an entirely

HTML format with databases stored centrally on dedicated web pages along with the

feedback and geographical information. A major change that has been incorporated into

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the software package is the use of an administrator suite of programmes which allow the

waste management user to customise the data sets to their own particular purpose and

local circumstances.

A full description explaining step-by-step the ways in which the questionnaire has been

developed for this project is described in Chapter 6, which together with the description

of the construction of the questionnaire in a previous project’s report (Thomas et al, 2007)

provide a complete description of its development.

5.2 Development of a GIS

This has made use of the Google ™ mapping system which is a web based tool with free

access and usage. This was chosen as it provided nationwide coverage and could be

linked to postcode data for both waste producers and facility operators. The methodology

has used this basic mapping framework to include additional layers of information to

include the public service infrastructure (waste transfer stations, MRFs, civic amenity and

bring sites); private sector resource recovery enterprises specialising in reprocessing of

materials such as paper, glass, plastics, metals, timber, electronic equipment, office

furniture, organic waste; and also commercial waste disposal contractors (skip companies,

collection services etc). The information has been structured so as to provide additional

information to the user to select the type of facility and to calculate the distance from their

business location. Programming methods have also been developed to allow the mapping

system to be part of the administrator suite of programmes allowing customisation to

extend coverage to any part of the UK.

5.3 Testing the performance of the questionnaire

In order to test the usability and performance of the questionnaire the methodology

originally proposed selecting defined areas of the county of Hampshire which contained a

cross section of businesses typical of those to be found in Hampshire as a whole. This

part of the work was to be carried out in conjunction with the Natural Resources Team at

Hampshire County Council on the basis of business profiling and SIC codes. This did not

prove to be possible and after discussion with Ian Avery of the County Council and the

project manager an alternative strategy was developed based on the construction sector.

The methodology thus concentrated on identifying those businesses within 3 SIC code

groups within this sector and establishing a business database of those companies. Small

building related businesses were considered sufficiently different in their activities and

wastes produced to explore the ability of the questionnaire’s use in business types other

than food related, and also represent a significant SME sector – 8% of total number of

SMEs

After selection of the targeted business sector a methodology was developed to assess the

use of the questionnaire which had been modified to focus on this sector. This included an

interviewer-based survey covering a selection of businesses in this sector with the aim of

gaining a detailed and comprehensive picture of the sector’s waste generation and key

resource streams. To achieve this, a database containing business details of over 1000

SME companies working in construction in Hampshire was assembled. The companies

were first contacted by means of a mailshot explaining the purpose of the survey and

informing them that they may be contacted to participate. This was followed by telephone

contact prior to the planned survey dates to enlist companies to participate. This operation

20

was carried out by an experienced call person who also arranged interview times for the

field workers carrying out the survey. The interviews themselves were carried out by

persons not experienced in waste management and were aimed at being a half way house

between the interviewer/interviewee situation and self use of the questionnaire. The

interview process was also used to gain insight into methods for engaging business to

make use of self-assessment tools. Emphasis was placed on usability of the questionnaire

rather than a statistically robust sample and audit of this sector.

Plans for a second survey using a final version of the modified 'smart questionnaire' in

self-use format were not implemented due to the far more extensive work necessary to

adapt the questionnaire to the required format than had first been envisaged and the

difficulties experienced in engaging business experienced in the first survey. To

compensate for this a user group workshop was carried out in which the questionnaire

was tested by a group of users across a wider spectrum of businesses. Data from the user

survey were evaluated using standard statistical tests

5.4 Exploring how to engage businesses

The methodology was designed to explore what factors are important to engage business

in participation in the waste assessment surveys. The methodology also included seeking

ways to improve through communications with business the benefits of improved

management of their resources. The research methodology was designed around the use

of focus groups and the interview process to explore these issues with selected SMEs.

These were structured to gain insight into their motivations and responses to these

communications and in particular explore these and other methods for incentivising

business to make use of the self-assessment tools.

5.5 Identifying practical location-specific resource recovery strategies.

The methodology for carrying this out was reliant upon the cooperation of project

partners and deriving full data sets from the survey work and was not fully implemented.

The proposed methodology was to identify materials that are currently recovered; single

companies generating a potentially recoverable waste stream that warrants individual

collection on a production/time basis; and clusters of businesses producing similar waste

types with joint recovery potential. Although the GIS system developed is capable of

doing this the major problem encountered was engaging sufficient businesses to give

representative data. It was thus not possible to explore the practicalities of solutions such

as single-stream collections, multi-service vehicles and shared facilities with the Natural

Resources team of Hampshire CC.

5.6 Prepare a blueprint for rolling out the smart questionnaire for use

in other locations.

The methodology for this has been to prepare guidelines on how to populate the database

with locally-relevant feedback information. This has involved the development of the

waste manager user inter face which allow direct input of information on local services

and facilities. It is still hoped that an additional local government collaborator might be

prepared to trial the blueprint for roll-out outside the Hampshire area.

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6. Questionnaire design

There are six main sections of the questionnaire, those for: business details; waste routes

and disposal methods used by the business; the containers used for this; the types and

amounts of waste generated by the business; occasional wastes; and waste awareness.

There is also a feedback section where the main results of the survey are summarised, and

feedback information relevant to the business is provided including geographical

information on local services within their vicinity.

The main part of the questionnaire is concerned with gathering information about material

that is removed from the business on a regular basis, i.e. with a frequency of collection of

at least about once a month. Details of material that leaves the business on a less frequent

basis is collected further on in the questionnaire, in the section on occasional waste.

6.1 Business details

Establishing business details includes the name of the interviewee, their job title, the

name of the business, its location, and its main business activity, facilities and secondary

activities, business premises, number of employees (both full and part-time and full time

equivalent) and times the business operates.

However, since the questionnaire described here has been expanded for use across the

complete spectrum of business activities, then the use of an in-built database would be

impracticable (mainly due to the length of time that would be required to gather the

information to populate such a database without using official lists e.g. inland revenue

VAT data which is not publicly available). Therefore, the user must enter the

interviewee's details manually (Figure 6.1)

Figure 6.1.1 Business details screen

22

The address details are stored in the database for later use in tailoring feedback to the

business and for geographical mapping for future infrastructure planning.

6.1.1 Business description

The section to determine the activity of a business based on a description provided by the

interviewee has been expanded to cover all SIC codes. However, for the survey of the

Construction sector, the search engine has been limited to this sector, to prevent

erroneous results being displayed, based on the description entered.

The example here (Figure 6.1.2) is for a Plumber, and the subsequent screen-captures

show the initial result obtained (gives a range of business sectors to choose from), and the

result from selecting the ‘Construction’ sector.

Figure 6.1.2: Business description entry screen

This gives the result shown in Figure 6.1.3, showing a range of business sectors that

contain a match for the search keyword ‘Plumber’, as entered as the description of the

business.

Figure 6.1.3: Example of initial results screen

23

On selecting the ‘Construction’ option, the next screen displays a list of possible matches

within the ‘Construction’ sector. In this case (Figure 6.1.4), only one match is found: for

‘Plumbing’. This can then be selected, and the activity of the business is recorded as such.

Alternatively, if the interviewee is not happy with the match, they can then select the

‘none of these’ option, and they are then taken to a list of construction-related business

activities from which they can select their activity.

Figure 6.1.4: Example of more specific results screen

After the construction and demolition sector survey the questionnaire was updated so that

it functioned for all business activities. In addition, it was modified to ensure that it was

flexible enough to cope with all business sectors, and to limit the display of erroneous

matches. The first screen after the business details have been entered thus asks about the

type of business (relevant for questions asked later); business activity, split into areas

(Manufacturing; Retail and commerce; Services; and Resources), before asking for a

description of the business activity (Figure 6.1.5).

Figure 6.1.5: Business activity initial screen (for all business types)

Full details of the flow of the questionnaire, and inter-dependency of the questions asked

within the modified business details section is given in Appendix 2. Again, the flow of

the questionnaire has been designed so as to eliminate the asking of redundant questions.

For example, if the interviewee indicates they are self-employed or a sole trader, then this

24

will affect what screens are subsequently displayed. If they indicate that they are not

based at home, then they are asked questions about their business premises (whether it is

owned/managed, etc.; Figure 6.1.6), and then questions about their waste storage facilities

(space for storage; whether share bins with other businesses, etc.; Figure 6.1.7). In

contrast, if the business is based at home, then they are not asked questions about their

premises, and the questions relating to waste storage are worded accordingly (i.e. share

storage space with household bins?; Figure 6.1.8).

Figure 6.1.6: Business premises (not based at home)

25

Figure 6.1.7: Waste storage space (not based at home)

Figure 6.1.8: Waste storage space (based at home)

26

Questions related to business premises concern whether they are owned or leased/ rented/

managed, shared with other businesses, and how much storage space they have for waste

and whether this is shared with other businesses and how many. This is mainly

background information which may be useful in checking waste data against constraining

factors on waste management operations.

It should be mentioned that no questions as to business income or turnover are asked. As

the questionnaire is not being used by a government agency directly, businesses would be

under no obligation to divulge this, what is often seen as sensitive, information and it was

expected that questioning of this nature would lead to businesses not wanting to take part.

Size banding is done on staffing levels alone.

Since the size of the business may be very small, then the number of staff should include

everyone who works there (including owners), both full and part-time. In addition, any

variation in staffing levels throughout the year can be logged; i.e. staff employed on a

seasonal basis.

Details of the hours per day, days per week and weeks per year that the business operates

is recorded. These questions are asked, as they may help to explain differences in waste

generation for similar businesses. Also, it is important to know if the business is closed

for any length of time (excluding standard public holidays), since this may affect the

calculation required to determine the annual levels of material generated.

6.2 Waste removal or disposal options

The interviewee is first asked to select the different disposal options that they use for their

regular waste (Figure 6.2.1) and separate information is then collected for each option

positively selected.

This section is ostensibly the same as before, although the layout has been improved to

make it more user-friendly. In addition, the information gathered for the various disposal

options has been changed in order to increase the automation of the analysis of results.

Now, the same information (container types, frequency of collection, etc.) that was

gathered for the ‘Local Authority’ and ‘Private Waste/Recycling Company’ disposal

routes is also gathered for the following additional routes:

• ‘Material sent back to a central depot or similar’

• ‘Removed by another business to use as a material for their process’

• ‘Taken directly to a waste transfer station’

• ‘Taken directly to a landfill site’

• ‘Waste is dealt with by another way’

27

Figure 6.2.1: List of disposal options

The other options (HWRC, recycling banks, charity, and taken home) have a slightly

different format, in that the information is gathered on one input screen. Also, since it is

unlikely that a business will use a standard waste container for material taken to a

HWRC, to a recycling bank, taken home or donated to a charity or similar, images of

containers indicative of the types and size most likely to be used for such a purpose are

given (Figure 6.2.1). Again, a description of the material donated, the number of

containers and the frequency of collection; and, if known, the weight of material can be

entered based on the interviewee's responses.

For each of the removal options selected in the previous section, the questionnaire now

gathers information about the type and number of different containers used for removal of

material from the business. Images and descriptions of the bins are given in an attempt to

give the interviewee as much information as possible in order to make the right choice.

28

Figure 6.2.1: Example of material taken to HWRC details page

An example of the container selection screen is shown in Figure 6.2.3. The interviewee

can then select which containers they have from this list, giving the number of each type

of container they use and for what type of material i.e. whether mixed waste, one type of

waste, mixed recyclate or one type of recyclate. In addition, the list is also specific to the

type of activity (i.e. SIC code) undertaken by the business. For instance, the list of

containers for manufacturing businesses may include tankers, whilst they are not included

for businesses such as restaurants, since it is unlikely that this type of business will use

tankers for waste removal. Using filtered lists ensures that the questioning remains

succinct and not confusing for the user. If the interviewee indicates that a company not

included in the database removes material from their business, then a generic list is

displayed containing a complete list of all containers available.

29

Figure 6.2.3: Example of bin type selection screen for main waste routes

The next screen (Figure 6.12) then asks for information about how full each container is

when it is collected, and details of the frequency of collection (so the annual waste

arisings can be determined).

Figure 6.2.3: Example of bin details type selection screen for main waste routes

30

Facilities such as Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRC) and bring sites were

included within the questionnaire, although it was appreciated that the use of these by

commercial entities may give rise to some waste management licensing issues. It was also

appreciated that commercial use of HWRCs is illegal without ‘reasonable’ charges being

levied and that the use of household waste receptacles and recycling banks is not a

preferred route, although in some cases this may not be illegal. It was considered,

however, that as one of the key purposes of the questionnaire was to elicit information on

what happens to waste arisings these routes should be included. It is a reality that some

companies do use these facilities and it is therefore important to estimate how much

resource follows this route. It can also be difficult to differentiate between what is a legal

use and what is not as, for example, some HWRCs accept commercial waste for a charge

and some LAs have arrangements with pubs to use their bottle banks in exchange for

siting them in their car parks. In a similar way the questionnaire attempts to capture data

from sole traders working from home and disposing of materials in their own bins or

those of their customers: not necessarily an area of illegal activity but one which should

not be ignored. The main function of the questionnaire was not to regulate or police what

goes on but simply to record it. The information gained could also have a secondary role

in drawing attention to irregular disposal practices via the feedback given to those

companies currently using non-preferred or illegal routes.

6.3 Waste composition section

This section of the questionnaire collects information about the types of material that the

business produces on a regular basis and is removed by the local authority; a private

company; another business; taken to a waste transfer station or landfill site directly; or the

‘dealt with by another way’ option.

The section has been completely revised in order to make it much simpler; the many

different pages that a business had to go through in the previous version of the

questionnaire in order to select the different waste materials that it produced have been

removed and replaced by a single page. This page lists all the sub-categories of wastes,

grouped by main waste type; the business can then select the wastes that it produces from

this list, plus give a description of the waste types produced within each main waste

category. An example of the waste page is shown on Figure 6.3.1.

31

Figure 6.3.1: Example of waste page

The list shown has been organised so that it is prioritised (ordered) for the type of wastes

that businesses within the Construction sector are most likely to produce. The full list of

waste types is given in Appendix 1. The list shows the orders and wording (description)

of the waste types for the Construction and Demolition sector survey. After this survey,

further modification was made to this section in preparation for use of the questionnaire.

This involved the introduction of several databases that allow the waste page to be

dynamic; that is, the order that the waste categories appear, and the text that is displayed

for each category, etc., is dependent upon the SIC code (activity) of the business. Further

details of this are given in appendix 4.

6.4 Bin-filling section

The next stage of the questionnaire is where the interviewee fills up each of the different

containers with the different materials that go into each container. Volumes rather than

weights are asked for and the questionnaire has an inbuilt database of all densities based

on waste type and business, sourced from the Environment Agency. Containers used can

be grouped to save time but to avoid errors only where bins contain material of the same

composition. As the interviewee selects the percentage (by volume) of each material that

goes into the container, a graph is displayed at the left-hand side of the screen as a visual

aid (Figure 6.4.1).

32

Figure 6.4.1: Example of bin-filling page

6.5 Occasional waste section

This section collects information about waste produced on a less regular basis; i.e.

occasional waste that the business has generated within the previous twelve months. This

section has been split into two sections, and the interviewee can indicate on the start page

(Figure 6.5.1) whether they have produced any material from the following:

• waste from maintenance and refurbishment activities

• other waste produced occasionally throughout the year

Figure 6.5.1: Occasional waste start page

33

An explanation of the sorts of material generated for each type is given on the page when

the user scrolls over the appropriate text (so as to minimise clutter on the page).

For each maintenance or refurbishment activity, the interviewee should select the material

generated by the activity, plus the volume of waste removed, and the frequency with

which this material is produced is selected: the range for this is from a minimum of once

less often than four years, to ten times every year to allow as much flexibility of choice as

possible. The interviewee can also indicate whether the material is recycled or not; if they

do not know then they can select ‘not sure’.

In a similar manner to the main waste section, the occasional waste section has also been

simplified, with there being a single list of waste types for each type of occasional waste,

as for the regular waste. However, the list is ordered somewhat differently, in order to

reflect the nature of the types of waste likely to be produced on an occasional basis (see

Figure 6.5.2).

Figure 6.5.2: Occasional waste categories page

As many wastes as necessary an be selected from this list, and on the next screen (Figure

6.5.3) the person can then indicate the amount of each waste type selected, and the

frequency with which this is produced. The amount of waste is indicated by selecting a

container volume that matches this amount. In this way, the amount of occasional waste

can be included in the feedback pie chart displayed later in the questionnaire. It also

enables the results to be analysed more readily (previously, the occasional waste data had

to be analysed manually at a later date).

34

Figure 6.5.3: Occasional waste amounts and frequency input screen

6.6 Waste awareness section

This section gathers information about how aware the interviewee is with regard to waste

regulations, legislation etc., and is logged so that appropriate feedback can be given. For

purposes of the survey, it is not only important to know the waste arisings from a business

type, but also to gain an understanding of the levels of awareness businesses currently

have. If new structures are to be put into place, it is possible that businesses will need to

be made more aware of the issues involved and the need for appropriate management.

Questions were targeted to understand if businesses really understood as to what their

legal obligations were. Asking about licences rather than waste transfer notes enabled the

user to think more about the reasons why a transfer note is required, and feedback on this

important aspect to be given. Housekeeping issues such as waste expenditure and auditing

follow to assess current activity and if there is an understanding of the linkages between

the two. Enquiring about Business Environment Groups links into the housekeeping

questioning as an assessment of their current status and potential development may be

made. The section ends by asking about legislation or initiatives, if they aware of any

rather than fully conversant. One of the options given was ‘Special Waste Regulations’ –

old legislation, but was included to assess how many businesses were actually aware of

this. The correct answer is given in the feedback to alleviate any misconceptions.

This section has been changed slightly since the previous version of the questionnaire, in

order to make it clearer and more user-friendly: instead of selecting ‘Yes’ if the

interviewee is aware of any waste legislation etc., and then a list appears, the list is

displayed directly so that the interviewee can examine it and decide if they are aware of

any of these before selecting ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; and then highlighting the legislation they are

aware of (Figure 6.6.1).

35

Figure 6.6.1: Waste awareness input screen

6.7 Feedback section

6.7.1 Pie Chart

From the collected information the questionnaire calculates details of the waste

composition and percentage recycling rate in order to provide the interviewee with instant

feedback (Figure 6.7.1). The material that this relates to has been expanded to include

additional disposal routes (other than just local authority and private waste/recycling

company, as was the case in the previous version of the questionnaire), as was discussed

in section 2.2, and any occasional waste.

The compositional pie chart is the composition by weight, normalised to a monthly

material generation. This has been done in order to account for the different collection

frequencies with which different materials may be collected from the business. Because

the programme does not automatically account for any closure periods for the business, it

was decided that normalising to a monthly figure would be better than an annual figure,

which can be subsequently determined during analysis of the data.

Also given is the split between material disposed and recycled by the business based on

information collected during the questionnaire; and the potential split based on

assumptions as to whether each material produced by the business has the potential to be

recycled using present methods.

36

Figure 6.7.1: Summary of feedback waste pie chart

6.7.2 Feedback report

The main change to the questionnaire has been the introduction of an automated feedback

section. If the interviewee indicates that they wish to receive feedback relating to

regulations and help/advice on ways to minimise waste, etc., then an automated report

folder containing this information will be generated by the questionnaire. The interviewee

may select whether they receive this information by post (printed documents), or instantly

(copy of the report folder on a CD).

Figure 6.7.2: Example of feedback page

37

If they select to receive it instantly, then they are taken to a page that lists all the report

documents generated for their business, based on their responses throughout the

questionnaire (Figure 6.7.2). As well as copying the documents to a CD, the reports can

also be viewed on the screen; this method is used for the internet-based version of the

questionnaire, and will allow the interviewee to print or save the documents directly to

their computer (Figure 6.7.3).

Figure 6.7.3: Example of feedback report document

As mentioned, the reports generated by the questionnaire are dependent upon the

responses given during the questionnaire. This applies to a) the types of waste produced

by the business (both main and occasional); and b) the responses to the waste awareness

questions. Hence, the feedback is tailored and targeted to the specific needs of the

business. For example, the screen-captures here indicate that the business produces

various forms of Construction and Demolition waste, various forms of metal waste and

wood, so the feedback report contains various documents relating to these waste types. In

addition, there are various documents relating to legislation, etc., generated by the

answers given in the waste awareness section; for example, the business indicated that it

monitored its waste expenditure, so the questionnaire has generated a feedback document

relating to waste expenditure (see Figure 6.7.3).

The full list of report documents is given in Appendix 3; the name of the document is

indicative of its contents and, for the wastes, the type of waste it relates to. In order to

determine which report documents to generate for feedback, the questionnaire uses an in-

built database with a matrix that details what report(s) should be generated for each type

of waste produced by the business; and for each response option in the waste awareness

section. Also, the questionnaire has been programmed to avoid duplication of any report

38

documents displayed on the feedback screen; for instance, there is always a separate

report relating to each of the main waste categories; so, if a business produces more than

one sub-category of waste within a particular category, more than one copy of the same

report would be generated without this duplication check.

It should be noted that within our generic set of documents we have refrained from

cutting and pasting information from other sources because of issues of copyright and

responsibility for ownership etc. There is however no reason why the waste awareness

section should not include links to government websites and other reliable sources. The

existing documents have been included to provide a practical example of how the system

works, but in fact they mainly consist of links to webpages of our own construction which

contain our own advisory documents.

6.7.3. Data retrieval The end user has no power to retrieve information other than in the form that is prescribed

by the system administrator. The data entered by the user in response to the questions

asked is stored in the form of an access database, however, and can therefore be

interrogated by the administrator in whatever way is required, provided this is supported

by the original classifications. There is also potential for looking at 'smart' ways in which

the data can be interrogated in relation to specific areas of interest to the user, but this has

not been attempted in the framework of the current project.

6.8 Mapping section

In addition to providing instant feedback, the questionnaire also has a mapping tool linked

to it. This initially displays a screen with an embedded map showing the location of the

business, based on the postcode entered at the start of the questionnaire (Figure 6.8.1).

The map facility is a proprietary system provided by Google™, and has full functionality

i.e. zoom, multi-mode etc.

Figure 6.8.1 Mapping tool initial screen

39

At the bottom of the mapping screen are several buttons that can be selected in order to

show the various waste/resource facilities located in the vicinity of the business. These

are: recycling centres; transfer stations; landfill sites; private waste/recycling companies;

and the local authority. Figure 6.8.2 shows the display screen when the private

waste/recycling company (‘PWRC’) button is selected. This brings up a list of companies

and displays the distance (as the crow flies) of each one from the business. The list of

PWRCs (or other facilities) can be sorted either alphabetically or by distance from the

user, by clicking on the name or distance frames. The exact location of a selected facility

is shown on a smaller map inset within the main screen.

Figure 6.8.2: Map showing location of private waste/recycling companies

Within the first screen (Figure 6.8.1) there is also a materials indicator which allows the

material for recycling to be entered: this then modifies the list of companies or facilities to

those that deal with that material (Figure 6.8.3). Information about the selected company

or facility, its address and opening hours can then be displayed as for the extended list

(Figure 6.8.4). If desired the information can be printed out for reference.

40

Figure 6.8.3: Map showing locations of private waste/recycling companies accepting

batteries

Figure 6.8.4: Map showing selected private waste/recycling company that accept

batteries with detailed location map

41

An important feature of the mapping tool is that it is also linked to the questionnaire

information and for the purposes of feedback only displays facilities that handle the types

of waste the business has indicated, in the questionnaire, that it produces; for example,

there is no point in displaying companies that handle fluorescent lights if the business has

not indicated that it produces this type of waste. This ability of the tool is achieved

because the information displayed on the screen is generated from various in-built

databases that are linked to the questionnaire. Firstly, there are several databases that

contain details of the various waste facilities and private waste/recycling companies -

including the information that is to be displayed in the information pane. These details can

be edited through the administration section linked to the questionnaire (see section 7).

Additional databases are then linked to these which are used to indicate what materials are

handled by each facility/company. It is not sensible to include every type (i.e. category

and sub-category) of waste used by the questionnaire within these databases, however.

Therefore a separate database was created that is used to translate the categories used in

the questionnaire into a shortened list of waste types. For instance, the “Paper & Card”

category has been split into two waste types: “Paper” and “Card”, and each of the sub-

categories of “Paper & Card” is allocated to one of these waste types. Hence, if a business

indicates that it produces “Newspaper” waste, then the mapping tool will show any

facility that handles “Paper”.

As mentioned, one feature of the mapping tool is that it displays the ('as-the-crow-flies')

distance between the business and the facility/company. This is achieved by use of a

database that contains a list of full postcodes covering the whole of Hampshire, together

with the corresponding Ordnance Survey grid reference (both the Northing and Easting

values are quoted to six digits, giving a location accurate to 10 metres). Hence, this

database can be used to translate the postcode of the facility/company to an O.S grid

reference, and the distance between the business and each facility/company calculated

using the following equation:

−+

−=

2

21

2

21

1000100010001000)(tan

NorthingNorthingEastingEastingkmcedis

The current version of the tool works in radial distance from a given point in order to be

able to bring up the whole range of different facilities within the specified distance. The

Google mapping system does allow route planning, giving precise distance by road and

navigational instructions, but to work out this information for say 50 facilities in a 10-

mile radius is expensive in computational time and may cause an irritating delay to an on-

line user for little immediate benefit. Once a site has been selected by a given user then

navigational directions could also be provided but this facility has not been developed

within the current project.

42

7. Customising the questionnaire for different geographical

locations and user groups

Customising the questionnaire for different geographical locations and user groups is

carried out through an administration section that is linked to, but separate from the

questionnaire itself. It has been set up with two purposes in mind: namely, to enable the

various inbuilt databases within the questionnaire to be populated and edited without the

need to edit the databases directly; and to populate the databases with

location/geographically specific information so that it can be used outside of the present

target area of Hampshire. In this way, the questionnaire can be used by, for example,

local authorities throughout the country, who can populate the databases with their own

information; for instance, resource facilities, and waste and recycling companies that

operate within their area.

The front page of the administration section (Figure 7.1) has a drop-down contents menu,

where the user can select the database that they wish to populate or edit. Details of each

of the different parts of the administration section are given below.

Figure 7.1: Front page of administration section

7.1 Item lists

This menu (Figure 7.1.1) contains pages for modifying the databases associated with the

determination of the business activity of a company; and information about the various

disposal options that might be used by a business for removal of its waste.

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7.1.1 Business activity search words

The section relating to the determination of the business activity is split into two parts:

one for editing the search words associated with a particular SIC code (business activity);

and one for adding a new search word. The search words are used by the questionnaire to

determine the business activity by searching for a match (or multiple) matches against the

description (of their business activity) entered by the user.

Figure 7.1.1: Item lists section

If the user selects the first part they can then select the business activity they wish to edit.

Firstly, they should select from a list of main business activity groups (Figure 7.1.2; see

Appendix 2 for the full list of groups).

Figure 7.1.2: Selection of main activity group

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Selection of a particular main group brings up a list of business activities (SIC groups)

and associated SIC codes (Figure 7.1.3). Within each SIC code is a further list of business

activities that can be found within that SIC code. In order to edit the list of search words

associated with a particular SIC code, the user clicks on the “edit” icon, which opens a

new page where search words can be viewed, deleted or added (Figure 7.1.4).

Figure 7.1.3: List of SIC code groups and business activities therein

Figure 7.1.4: Example of search words edit screen

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7.1.2 Waste containers

7.1.2.1 Adding a waste container

This part of the administration section is used to select the bins/containers (including

compactors, baling machines, etc.) that the user wishes to include within the

questionnaire. This is done simply by selecting from a pre-populated list of containers

(with images; see Figure 7.1.5). There is also a facility that allows the user to upload a

new container image, which will then be added to the selection list.

Figure 7.1.5: Screen showing list of containers

For each container selected, the user can then enter the appropriate information for that

container (Figure 7.1.6): name, volume, description, and various factors associated with

the container, that are used within the questionnaire for calculation (e.g. the compaction

factor, important for baler machines and compaction units). It is also possible to change

the container image.

46

Figure 7.1.6: Edit screen for selected container

7.1.2.2 Changing the container volume

If it is not necessary to first add containers, then the user can go directly to the edit page,

where the details associated with each of them, as described above, can then be edited

(Figure 7.1.7).

Figure 7.1.7 Container editing screen

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7.2 Regional information

There are various parts of the administration section that are associated with this that

allow the user to input regional information that is used within the questionnaire to

determine various aspects; for instance, the local authority area within which a business is

situated.

7.2.1 Editing a local authority

Here, the user can add, remove or edit a local authority. Figure 7.2.1 shows the edit

screen for the local authorities within Hampshire.

Figure 7.2.1: Local authority edit screen

Once the database has been populated with the desired local authorities, the user can then

add geographical information within a particular authority’s boundary. This is essentially

a list of towns and post code data found within the boundary of the local authority, and

Figure 7.2.2 shows an example of the edit screen for this, where the user can add, remove

or edit details of towns, etc.

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Figure 7.2.2: Towns and post code input screen

In addition, as is applicable to this project, it allows data to be added for a group of local

authorities that make up a county (in this case, Hampshire); or even the whole country.

Once the information has been added to the database, the postal towns can be edited or

removed in the “Modify Town/Code” section (Figure 7.2.3)

Figure 7.2.3: Towns and post code edit screen

49

In addition, information about waste facilities can be associated with a particular local

authority. These facilities include waste transfer stations, landfill sites, recycling banks,

and household waste recycling centres. The information that can be added for all but the

recycling banks is similar for each type of facility. An example is shown in Figure 7.2.4,

for waste transfer stations. Information that can be added includes the area (i.e. local

authority within which the facility lies; the name and address of the facility; and, if

appropriate, details of the operator of the facility.

Figure 7.2.4: Transfer station input screen

For recycling banks, the user can add or edit a list of recycling banks, or location of

banks, within a local authority area (Figure 7.2.5); for instance, a list of major towns or

regions, since a local authority will generally contain a large number of recycling banks,

and it is impractical to input each one of these into the database.

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Figure 7.2.5: Recycling banks input/edit screen

For each type of facility there are also administration pages (see Figure 7.2.6, that shows

the screen for transfer stations) where the user can edit details of, or remove, a facility.

Figure 7.2.6: Transfer station edit screen

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7.2.2 Private waste/recycling companies

As well as being able to input information about local authority facilities, the

administration section also allows the user to add, remove or edit details of private waste

and recycling companies that operate within a particular area (Figure 7.2.7). This means

that someone completing the questionnaire is not faced with a long list of companies that

operate within the United Kingdom, but sees a limited list that is relevant to the location

of the business.

Figure 7.2.7: Private waste/recycling companies screen

There are examples where companies pay charitable or social enterprises to remove waste

from their business and these activities would be captured within this section. The term

'private' may not necessarily be the ideal one to use in this context, and this may be

changed in revised versions of the questionnaire to take into account this type of activity.

7.3 Bin registration

Once the databases have been populated with lists of waste containers, and

waste/recycling facilities and companies then the next step is to register what waste

containers are used to take materials to the facilities; or are used by the local authority and

private companies for removal of material from businesses. In this way, during the

questionnaire the interviewee is not faced with a long list of all possible containers that

could be used for removal of material; but rather with only a restricted list that is

applicable to the disposal option/company they selected, based particularly on

information gathered from the waste/recycling companies. An example of the

52

administration pages for the different disposal options is shown in Figure 7.3.1. Here, the

disposal option is via a local authority, and the user can select the particular containers

(from the list populated previously) that the local authority uses for collection. The

included containers are then added to the database of containers associated with that local

authority. Similar administration pages are used to populate the databases for the other

disposal options.

Figure 7.3.1: Register bin selection screen

7.4 Design waste page

This part of the administration section is used to populate the databases that are employed

to assign information about the layout and contents of the waste pages (see section 6.3)

for each business activity/SIC code. There are separate pages for regular waste, plus

maintenance/refurbishment and other occasional waste produced throughout the year, but

the administration pages are the same for each. In order to design the waste page, the first

step is to select the main group of business activities, as was done for the search words

(see section 7.1.1). If desired, the user may then select an individual SIC code (see Figure

7.4.1).

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Figure 7.4.1: Selection of SIC group

On the next screen the user can edit various elements of the waste pages. Firstly (Figure

7.4.2), the order that the different main waste categories on the waste page can be

changed to that desired by the user, and which matches the most likely order of

prevalence/abundance of waste types for the particular SIC code/main group of business

activities that were selected previously.

Figure 7.4.2: Waste order selection screen

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In addition, the user can choose which sub-categories of waste should be included on the

waste page, and the text that is displayed for each main and sub-category of waste (Figure

7.4.3). Again, this allows the user to adapt the waste page so that the sub-categories of

waste that are unlikely to be produced by a particular SIC code, etc. are excluded (but

there is always an “Other” sub-category of each waste type, and this should always be

included so as to allow for flexibility within the questionnaire). Also, the ability to edit

the text that is displayed means that the wording/phrasing can be adapted to best suit the

type of business to which the waste data relates.

Figure 7.4.3: Sub-category selection and text display screen

Finally, the user can also edit the text that is displayed in the information pop-up windows

associated with each sub-category of waste; these are used as an aid to the user and gives

information and examples of the types of waste to be found within that waste sub-

category. An example of this is shown in Figure 7.4.4, for the ORGC sub-category of

organic waste (“Food waste containing no meat (including slurries)”). Again, through the

administration pages, the information pop-ups can be made specific to a particular

business activity.

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Figure 7.4.4: Example of information pop-up window edit screen

Once the user has completed editing the waste page here, then can then load a test page

(Figure 7.4.5) to check that the layout, etc., is satisfactory.

Figure 7.4.5: Example of test waste page

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7.5 Waste density

The administration pages also allow the user to change the densities of each waste type,

either for a single SIC code or a group of SIC codes (Figure 7.5.1).

The densities are used within the questionnaire to convert the waste volumes to weights,

primarily to determine the annual waste arisings for a business. The ability to change the

density of a particular waste for different SIC codes is necessary because the densities can

vary based on the nature of the waste, which is linked to the business activity; just as the

European Waste Catalogue assigns different waste codes for essentially the same waste,

based on the nature of the business that produces that waste.

Figure 7.5.1: Waste density edit screen

To prevent input of an erroneous value, a minimum and maximum value for the density

of each waste type is given as a guide to the user.

7.6 Feedback report

As mentioned in section 6.7.2, the instant feedback that is generated once the

questionnaire has been completed is tailored to the answers given throughout the

questionnaire. Ostensibly, the feedback relates to two aspects: the types of waste

generated by the business; and the interviewee’s knowledge (or lack thereof) of waste

legislation and regulations.

57

Figure 7.6.1 shows the administration page relating to the feedback reports for the

different waste types. Each entry represents a link between a waste type and a report that

should be generated if a business produces that type of waste. Hence, the duplication, as

some waste types are linked to more than one report.

The user can add, remove or edit entries on this page.

Figure 7.6.1: Waste report ID edit screen

Figure 7.6.2 shows the administration page for the legislation and waste feedback reports

themselves. Here, the user can add, remove or edit both the display details for each report,

and also the individual reports themselves.

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Figure 7.6.2: Legislation/Waste reports list edit screen

7.7 Mapping

There are no administrator pages for the GIS mapping as this is all done automatically

through information entered in other databases. So, for example, when details of a

household waste recycling centre are entered via the administration pages the address,

opening hours and materials handled are entered. These are linked to the postcode, which

in turn is linked to the map coordinates and the materials recycling locator on the GIS

map. Inclusion is determined also by the proximity of the facility to the waste producer:

this could be set on the basis of a radial distance or by including the nearest facility if

none are present within the set distance.

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8. Survey of SMEs in the C&D sector

8.1 Selection of businesses

Construction and construction-related SMEs were targeted for the survey. A list of

businesses was produced from the FAME database; the www.accessplace.com website-a

searchable website (which gives contact details of businesses in Hampshire); and the

National Federation of Builders http://www.builders.org.uk. The later however were

unwilling to give details directly without entering into a contract. A database of around

1,000 businesses consisting of builders, electricians, plumbers and carpenters was

constructed within the SIC codes shown in Table 8.1.

Site preparation including demolition and wrecking of buildings 45.1

Building of complete constructions or parts thereof; civil engineering including general construction of buildings and civil engineering works; erection of roof covering and frames construction of motorways, roads, railways, airfields and sport facilities construction of water projects 45.2

Building installation Including installation of electrical wiring and fittings insulation work activities plumbing 45.3

Building completion Including plastering joinery installation floor and wall covering painting and glazing 45.4

Table 8.1 The Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes covered in the survey

The actual size of the construction sector in Hampshire as taken from Office for National

Statistics (ONS) counts is shown in table 8.2 and it was therefore thought that the

database established with contact details of approximately 1/3 of these was representative.

SIC code group Business count within each size band

Micro 2-9

Small 10-49

Medium 50-249

Total

Building construction (45.2) 1250 295 50 1595

Building installation (45.3) 600 160 25 785

Building completion (45.4) 515 95 10 620

Total 2365 550 85 3000

Table 8.2: ONS counts of C&D sector businesses within Hampshire

The research used size bands for micro businesses of 2-9 employees. This excluded

businesses with only one employee (including the owner), which effectively operate as

individuals or sole traders. It was assumed that a large proportion of these operate from

home rather than from business premises with commercial waste collections. These

businesses therefore mainly make use of household waste services at their own homes or

at other people's houses (e.g. small builders, plumbers, electricians etc), and the waste

created is disposed of by the householder. In order to avoid cross contamination of the

data by counting this waste as both commercial and MSW, and because the research was

particularly looking at opportunities for co-collection and processing of C&I waste from

60

SMEs with MSW, micro businesses with only one employee were therefore not counted

in the analysis.

A random sample of businesses were contacted by phone between one to two days before

the surveyor planned on calling and the survey was aimed at gaining the cooperation from

greater than 10% of the businesses in the data base. This would not give sufficient data

for a full statistical audit of the sector in Hampshire but would be enough to be able to

provide indicative estimates of waste activities of SMEs in the groups 45.2, 45.3 and

45.4. The main purpose of the survey was, however, to test the questionnaire design both

in its usability and to give an indication of the level of detail that could be obtained from

this sector. It was also the first time that the questionnaire had been used in any other

SME business other than food related activities.

Two third-party surveyors (no survey experience other than familiarisation with the

questionnaire) were employed for three weeks along with one person to cold-call the

businesses by telephone. The cold-caller was also instructed to keep records of all calls

and log if a business was contactable or not, and the reasons why a business did not want

to take part. All three temporary employees were given the questionnaire to ‘play’ with

and if there were any parts they did not understand or thought that it did not make sense

to them then notes were taken and discussed.

Surveyors were given a health and safety debrief and taken through their risk assessments

before signing off. Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) was provided in the form of hi-

visibility vest, hard hat and boots. During the surveys they were required to call in at

regular intervals (lone working).

8.2 Business responses to the survey

As part of the questionnaire the interviewee was invited to comment on their waste

management activities, problems they had encountered, improvements they felt could be

made, perceived barriers to recycling and others. The most common issues commented on

by the SMEs taking part in the survey were costs and lack of infrastructure.

Comments from businesses regarding the cost of recycling and consequent lack of

incentive to do so were by far the most common received. These included the following:

• Have researched into office recycling but the costs are too high.

• Are well aware of our responsibilities, but unfortunately the cost out weigh the

practicality of doing it.

• The cost of manually going through the skips after taking into consideration the

cost of removing waste from the site is not cost effective.

• There should be less expenditure for small businesses with regards to their waste.

• The cost of having a bin for paint pots and plastic pots is too expensive for a small

company such as mine

• Do have two bins already for paper waste which is recycled but the cost of having

a further bin is too expensive.

• If the skips were less to hire we would consider recycling. Also if it was less than

landfill charges we would also consider doing more.

• If cost reduced and removed environmental charges, more likely to adhere more

consistently

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• Dropping of landfill tax.

• Lower costs would encourage better waste management.

• Frustrated at the cost and the difficulty in getting in some stuff recycled e.g.

asbestos cement, especially small amounts.

• Cost is a big issue.

• Being environmentally correct is an expensive hobby.

Some commented specifically on the need for incentives and the removal of financial and

regulatory barriers:

• More incentives need to be given to companies to entice them to be more

proactive in recycling.

• Taxation on land does not work as the costs get passed onto the client, also lack of

commercial opportunities.

• The rules and the cost are the main issues.

• Use Netregs all the time but gave up with Business Link Wessex and council

groups as information not enough and you always have to seek it out. Now pay a

health and safety consultant to oversee COSHH and environmental compliance at

cost of £2500 per annum.

• Regulations are time consuming.

• Eco friendly planning permissions are very hard to come by, please tell the

Government to instruct the local planners to work with us

• Current rules and regulations are restricting creative sustainable solutions to new

buildings – lowest common denominator syndrome destroys many eco-routes to

provision of sustainable housing.

• Too much government micro-management and TOO MUCH RED TAPE

Many businesses felt that local authorities could do more to help them recycle – and that

it was their responsibility to do, expressing links with household recycling:

• Common recyclables should be collected along with the domestic waste free of

charge (as there are houses next to the businesses).

• HCC needs a much more co-ordinated approach to collecting waste from small

businesses.

• NO support from local authority; should provide more help and support.

• Having a paper bin for office waste would be good - Hampshire CC do not offer

this service for small businesses.

• Councils should offer better services to businesses.

• Eastleigh Borough Council and our waste contractor should provide separate bins

for each type of waste - i.e. the same as domestic.

• Different regulations for home and business, no incentive for business.

The use of HWRCs featured frequently with most wanting easier access to these sites:

• Should be able to use HWRCs based on being a small business.

• Being able to use HWRCs.

• Make HWRCs usable by builders, even with a charge.

• HRWCs should be open to small businesses.

• Being able to use HWRCs would make sense in some cases.

• Small amounts of waste to the local HWRCs would save money, time and use less

fuel.

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• Also how some private companies manage to dump waste at household waste

depots when the rules clearly state they are not allowed.

Although one business was happy with their current arrangement with a HWRC:

• The HWRC are happy to take metals from plumbing work, including businesses

because it makes them some money.

Lack of facilities was often cited as a reason for not being able to recycle:

• Need sufficient means to recycle, more facilities.

• Would like to be able to recycle more paper for businesses.

• More initiatives that cover small and medium business.

• Make it easier to find waste recycle solutions.

• Recycle bins should be supplied free of charge for businesses or more central bins

for recycling should be provided.

• Business parks and industrial parks could have central recycle bins.

• Currently skips mixed and not small enough for separate types of waste for

recycling.

• Smaller skips for individual waste at the same price would be good.

• Options to recycle timber would be good.

• Private waste co not interested in recycling plastic sheets for covering buildings

scaffolding

More information was both wanted:

• It would be good to gain some additional information as to how to deal with waste

products.

And was needed – as this comment from a business not aware of the potential value of

their recyclate demonstrated:

• Have a great deal of aluminium waste and lead and copper and concerned it may

cost us a lot of money to dispose of it.

Some businesses commented that they sometimes left the householder to get rid of the

waste, where they were working on-site at individual properties. Others complained about

the policies of their waste management companies and what they will and will not collect.

There were some comments about environmental issues and a willingness to recycle but

not many and those expressed were usually as part of wider concerns about the current

difficulties faced in recycling for small businesses in this sector. These included:

• Our managing director is very positive about making changes to help the

environment.

• Our company has its own environmental policies and anything that can be reused

or recycled at the time is used accordingly.

• Trying to see if we can set up a Hampshire Trust For Sustainable Development

similar to the trust in Somerset.

• People are willing but it is too difficult (for them to recycle).

• (Working in a) rural area is an issue. Despite looking into things we fail to find

solutions ourselves.

• Ideally it would be a good idea to be able to segregate waste.

• There is too much packaging on goods.

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8.3 Survey Analysis and Results

8.3.1 Survey data analysis

Despite considerable effort in building a database of contact details for over one third of

the SME businesses involved in the sector and the time spent in cold-calling a large

proportion of these the number of respondents willing to take part in the survey was

disappointingly low. In the end it was only possible to survey 45 businesses by face-to-

face interviews over the 3 week period. The interviewers introduced the ‘smart’

questionnaire to the businesses who were then helped, if required, in navigating through

the pages. At the end of the survey only 30 usable samples were obtained – 16 in SIC

code group 45.2 (building construction); 8 in 45.3 (building installation)and 6 in 45.4

(building completion). Businesses were sampled in all three size bands but with a focus

on the smaller SMEs which are the more numerous and less studied group – 15 micro, 9

small and 6 medium businesses surveyed.

The results were analysed primarily in relation to the 3 SIC code groups, exploring the

average or typical waste arisings for these business types, based on average

waste/employee in order to aggregate the different business sizes into one group.

This approach was necessary to achieve statistically viable sample sizes and is supported

by the correlation that exists between business sizes and waste per employee, although

not a strong one. Since neither data set was normally distributed, Spearman’s rho

correlation coefficient was used to test the correlation between number of employees (full

time equivalent, fte) and amount of waste produced. Significant correlation were found

for the whole sample (0.416) It was therefore concluded that aggregating samples across

the size bands and working with waste/employee was an appropriate analysis approach.

The linearity of the relationship was also tested and showing a linear relationship between

them with an acceptable fit (R2 0.46 at 90% mean prediction interval).

Data was cleaned by identifying gross outliers in the results and considering by close

examination whether these represent reasonable but outlying cases or whether there were

issues that meant that these should be excluded from the analysis. In this way we felt the

results were not distorted by these extreme outliers even though this reduced the number

of cases analysed. This close examination of the data recorded from the surveyed

businesses also played a key role in exposing a particular issue relating to this type of

waste auditing of businesses in the C&D sector.

This concerned the fact that many businesses in this sector do not carry out their main

business activity at one site. They may operate from a business office or from home with

their employees working mainly on-site undertaking building construction, installation or

completion. In this situation, although waste management systems should and are likely

to be in place, when completing the questionnaire and providing information on who

removes their waste, what containers are used, how full they are, how often collected and

what materials they contain, difficulties may arise in recording all of the waste generated

by the business. This appeared to be clearly the case with some of the businesses

surveyed in particular some medium sized civil engineering and building construction

SMEs where the amount of waste recorded by the questionnaire appeared not to include

any waste from building construction work but to be more in-line with the amount of

waste likely to be generated by a small office. For this reason these cases had to be

excluded from the analysis on the assumption that they were incomplete records.

64

Scatterplot of total waste vs business size

Linear Regression with

90.00% Mean Prediction Interval

20 40 60 80

number of employees (fte)

0

1000

2000

total waste per business

�

�

�

�

�

��

�

��

� � ���

�

� �

�

�

�

�

�

�

�

�

�

��

�

�

total waste per business = -88.46 + 16.91 * fteemp

R-Square = 0.46

Figure 8.3.1: Scatterplot of total waste vs. business size

This highlights the issue that the questionnaire design needs to ask questions in such a

way and prompt interviewees (or those completing the self-assessment questionnaire) to

include all wastes from all sites that the business is carried out at, and not focus on one

site or business premises. This applies not only to the C&D sector but any business with

multiple premises or sites of work, although the C&D sector may have a higher

proportion of work carried out away from their business premises.

The key data collected was type and size of company (number of full-time equivalent

employees), waste arisings and composition, whether recycled or disposed and by what

route. Individual results for each business, and the average or mean values for each

business type were calculated. Average waste/employee for businesses in a specific SIC

code group provided comparisons between the different business types. This analysis was

also used to explore the typical composition of resources in the waste stream from each

SIC code group and the amount of recycling activity each engages in.

Statistical analysis focused on mean values and calculated the standard deviations,

standard errors and 90% confidence interval values. These provided checks on the

variability of the data and statistic robustness of the estimates. Due to the small sample

sizes there was high variability in the data and consequently the estimates of average

values are not considered very reliable – only providing indicative values for this sector.

To achieve more robust data requires further surveying and analysis.

65

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18

building

construction

building installation

building completion

average waste /employee (tonnes/a)

disposed

recycled

8.4 Survey results for SMEs in the C&D sector

8.4.1 Average waste arisings for each business type

The overall average waste arisings per employee for the main business types covered by

the survey are shown in Table 8.4.1. As can be seen the building construction sector

produces the highest waste/employee, and hence per business for SMEs in the same size

band.

business type SIC code group waste per employee

(tonnes/year)

Building construction 45.2 16.97

Building installation 45.3 3.18

Building completion 45.4 7.87

Table 8.4.1: Average waste arising by business type

Recycling activity in the C&D sector did not appear to be very high, with building

completion having the highest average rate at 24%, followed by building construction at

18%. Very little recycling (average rate 2%) was found amongst the building installation

businesses surveyed. However these average figures hide a very wide range of recycling

activity in individual SMEs. Whilst over half of the businesses surveyed recycled none of

their waste or very little, a few did recycle significant amounts. These mostly did so via

other routes and although one or two recycled with their local authority or waste

management company this was the exception. Other routes, such as material taken back

to a depot, away by other business or to a HWRC, were mostly used for recycling of

scrap metal or wood and some paper. Two businesses recycled rubble which was taken

away by another business. Of the Other routes for removal of waste used by businesses

(that is, all options other than removal by a local authority or private waste, recycling, or

reprocessing company), the most common options were taking waste or recyclables to

recycling banks or HWRCs; and material taken by another business or backfill (i.e.

material taken back to distribution depots, mostly packaging material for recycling from

retail outlets).

Figure 8.4.1: Waste recycled and disposed for each business type group

66

The recycling rates for different sectors recorded in the survey appear to be low, although

the questionnaire was designed to capture information on recycling in a number of ways.

The questionnaire asked businesses to describe waste taken away by a wide variety of

routes, and to specify when they knew whether these wastes went for recycling or

disposal. The 2-24% range for material recycled was the accumulated figure of waste

from all of these routes which could be identified as recycled. Where wastes were

collected either as mixed recyclables or single separated materials, identification of

recycling was straightforward. A very small minority of businesses took waste directly to

transfer stations; where this was subsequently recycled they were able to state this and it

was accounted for in the recycling rates. If a business had mixed wastes collected by a

local authority or a waste company it was not possible to tell if that waste was

subsequently sorted by the collector, and the survey had to rely on information from the

business on whether they were paying for a recycling or disposal collection. It is possible

that some businesses were unaware of recycling activities carried out by contractors after

skips had been collected from them, and that recycling rates were therefore higher than

recorded. Also the sample was very small – as it was designed to test the questionnaire

rather than survey the sector – and hence had potentially higher error bands.

It is likely, however, that recycling rates for all wastes (not just C&D) produced by C&D

sector SMEs will be lower than that quoted for C&D wastes overall. The following

comments were made in Waste Strategy 2007 and the BRE/AEAT ‘Developing a

Strategic Approach to Construction Waste report:

Waste also comes from refurbishment projects, many of which are small scale and

have restricted space for segregation and reprocessing, as well as a high

proportion of composite wastes with little or no reclamation value and limited

recycling potential.

The rates of re-use and recycling of construction wastes appear to be substantially

lower than for demolition wastes

Given that the survey focused on SMEs in building construction, installation and

completion it reflected mostly construction and refurbishment activities where lower

recycling rates are likely to be found.

8.4.2 Variance in the data

The average values for waste/employee for each business type and subsequent analyses

need to be evaluated in relation not only to the calculated mean but also to consider the

variance in the results achieved. Measures for standard deviation (std dev), standard error

(SE) and the 90% confidence interval (CI) were calculated and are presented in Table

8.4.2 and graphically in Figure 8.4.2

business type mean waste/employee (t/a) 90% CI (+/-) SE std dev

Building construction 16.97 5.59 3.19 12.76

Building installation 3.18 2.07 1.09 3.08

Building completion 7.87 4.04 2.01 4.91

Table 8.4.2: Statistical analysis values for waste/employee for each business type

67

45.445.345.2

SIC code group

40.00

20.00

0.00

waste per employee (tonnespa)

Figure 8.4.2: Mean values with error bars for waste/employee for SIC groups 45.2-4

8.4.3 Waste composition for each business type

Figures 8.4.3 and 8.4.4 show the estimated average composition of wastes from

businesses in each of the 3 main types of C&D sector SMEs.

0 3 6 9 12 15 18

building construction and

civil engineering works

building installation - inc

electrical and plumbing

building completion - inc

joinery, painting and

glazing

waste/employee (tonnes/a)

organic chemicals construction

glass metals paper + card

plastics wood other and unclassified

Figure 8.4.3: Average waste composition of C&D sector SMEs surveyed by type

68

Average composition for building construction SMEs

construction

53%

wood

7%

other and

unclassified

1%organic

6%

chemicals

3%

plastics

4%

paper + card

4%

metals

21%

glass

1%

Average composition for building installation SMEs

construction

12%

wood

4%

other and

unclassified

7%

organic

3% chemicals

1%

plastics

7%

paper + card

14%

metals

22%

glass

30%

Average composition for building completion SMEs

construction

27%wood

38%

other and

unclassified

2%

organic

2% chemicals

0.07%

plastics

5%

paper + card

4%

metals

6%

glass

16%

Figure 8.4.4: Average % composition of wastes from C&D sector SMEs

69

The composition of waste produced varies between these business types as might be

expected. The key compositional factors are:

• Construction and demolition (C&D) waste is a main element of waste from the

building construction sector, in which 3 subcategories are identified in the

questionnaire: excavation waste; dredging/tailing waste; and building materials

and refurbishment waste. Most of the wastes described by the businesses in the

survey were in the latter group of building materials and refurbishment waste,

with a small amount (about 10%) being described as excavation wastes.

• The second most specified waste material was metals

• paper and card is a fairly significant element in the waste of building completion

SMEs

• organic waste is a small fraction of wastes from this sector overall

• glass is a fairly insignificant component of building construction sector waste, but

more significant for building installation, and the largest component of waste from

the building completion sector

8.4.4 Estimates of wastes from C&D sector SMEs in Hampshire

The estimated average values for waste produced from the three main SIC code groups in

the C&D sector, together with data on the size of these sectors in Hampshire can be

extrapolated to estimate the potential resources in the waste stream from C&D sector

SMEs in Hampshire. However given the variability of the data and the small samples in

the survey the accuracy of these results is highly uncertain, as explained later, and should

only be taken as indicative.

The average waste /employee data for each of the SIC code groups surveyed, together

with national average number of employees in each business size band, and the number of

businesses of each type and size in Hampshire provided the basis of the calculations.

Data is available from the Small Business Service Analytical Unit, Department of Trade

and Industry (DTI) on the number of employees and number of enterprises for micro,

small and medium sized businesses nationally which is used to provide an average

number of employees for each size band as shown in Table 8.4.3

Business size

SIC code group Micro Small Medium

45.2 3.5 19.8 97.6

45.3 3.5 19.1 95.9

45.4 3.4 18.3 83.3

Source: Small Business Service Analytical Unit, DTI

Table 8.4.3: National average number of employees for C&D sector SMEs

Data was obtained from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) for the numbers of

businesses (unit counts of individual locations of businesses) for the specific SIC codes

and size bands that were covered by the survey (Table 8.4.4). This was used to gross-up

the estimates for average waste for each business type in the three size bands to the whole

population of SMEs.

70

SIC code group Business count within each size band

Micro 2-9

Small 10-49

Medium 50-249

Total

Building construction (45.2) 1250 295 50 1595

Building installation (45.3) 600 160 25 785

Building completion (45.4) 515 95 10 620

Total 2365 550 85 3000

Table 8.4.4: ONS counts of C&D sector businesses within Hampshire

This gave the estimated values for waste/business for micro, small and medium sized

SMEs in each SIC code group shown in Table 8.4.5.

Estimated total waste for Hampshire (tonnes/a)

Micro Small Medium total

business type (2-9 employees) (10-49 employees) (50-249 employees)

building construction 74,387 99,138 82,775 256,299

building installation 6,654 9,725 7,620 23,999

building completion 13,950 13,721 6,559 34,230

total 94,991 122,584 96,954 314,528

Table 8.4.5: Estimated total waste from the construction sector SMEs in Hampshire

It can be seen that the combination of both a higher waste produced per employee and the

greater size of the sector (53% of all C&D sector SMEs) results in the building

construction sector producing by far the greatest amount of waste – 81% of total waste

from the C&D sector. Waste arisings are fairly evenly spread across the different size

bands.

As stated at the beginning of this section this estimate of total waste from this sector for

Hampshire is not a highly significant or necessarily accurate result due to the small

sample sizes in the survey. Based on the 90% confidence interval range for the mean

values obtained in the survey data for each of the three SIC code groups it can be

estimated that this total value of 315,000 tonnes pa could be as low as under 200,000 or

high as over 430,000. More data are needed to improve the accuracy of this estimate.

The estimated key resource components of this SME waste stream estimated for

Hampshire as a whole from the survey data is shown in Figures 8.4.5 and 8.4.6. Due to

the dominance of the building construction sector the most significant resources are

construction and demolition wastes (including excavation wastes and building materials

and refurbishment waste) at 47%, followed by metals at 20% and wood at 10%.

71

wood

10%

other and

unclassified

1%

plastics

4%

organic

5%

chemicals

3%

paper + card

5%

metals

20%

glass

5%

construction

47%

Figure 8.4.5. Composition of wastes from C&D sector SMEs in Hampshire

0 50000 100000 150000 200000 250000 300000

building construction

building installation

building completion

tonnes/a

organic chemicals construction

glass metals paper + card

plastics wood other and unclassified

Figure 8.4.6: Estimated amount of waste from C&D sector SMEs in Hampshire by

composition and business type

Whether the total waste arisings are 315,000 tonnes pa or 100,000 tonnes more or less,

there are still significant amounts of construction and demolition wastes and metals and

wood contained in these wastes, most of which are currently disposed of. This offers

significant amounts of resources that may be potentially recyclable with suitable

collection provision. However it was not possible to identify from the survey results the

degree of contamination of these wastes and hence where additional recycling

opportunities may be found.

72

9. Business surveys on the use of the questionnaire

This chapter covers the business consultation work carried out by The Open University

Integrated Waste Systems group in 2006 & 2007.

Four workshops were conducted with Hampshire SMEs, drawn from a range of business

types. All workshops were timetabled as breakfast events. Experience tells us that,

particularly for small businesses, time away from core activities is always a luxury.

Running our events as a three hour breakfast activity and avoiding Monday mornings

helped to minimise disruption to the businesses. We also provided incentives, in the form

of an attendance allowance and take away information packs, to those attending.

Recruitment for the workshops was contracted to an external marketing organisation.

The workshops were designed to be interactive, minimising didactic activity and

PowerPoint presentations. In essence we wanted to hear what the businesses had to say

about waste management and structured the workshops to maximise the time to allow this

to happen.

The consultation process designed to achieve this is outlined diagrammatically in Figure

9.1

Figure 9.1: Consultation Map

Recruit Confirm Run Report Participant feedback

Workshop 2

Questionnaire developed

Review and testing

Beta 1 questionnaire

Beta 2 questionnaire

Final WasteQuest

questionnaire

Recruit Confirm Run Report Participant feedback

Workshop 1

Workshop 4

Workshop 3

73

9.1 Workshops 1 & 2 (23 June 2006)

Workshops 1 & 2 were conducted in the summer of 2006. They sought to improve

knowledge and understanding and gain an insight into business perspectives of the issues

of:

• What are the business needs?

• How might integration of C&I waste management into existing infrastructures

work?

• How best to raise awareness in an action oriented way?

• How to communicate with businesses and what to communicate?

• What, if any, are the incentives & other triggers for change?

9.1.1 Outputs from workshops 1 & 2

The first part of the session involved discussion in two groups – those that had already

been surveyed (S) and those that had had no contact with the project (NS) - of the

important waste management issues for businesses and the reasons that these issues are

important. There was significant convergence between the groups as illustrated in the

table below. Issues are presented followed by suggested solutions (in italic) to meet the

identified needs.

# Issue S / NS

1 The relatively small quantities of waste generated by small businesses are

often not of interest to waste contractors. Proposed collection charges

reflect this and are often high and / or may involve the business storing

waste (with any associated problems) until such time as there is sufficient

to trigger a waste contractor collection.

Both

Groups

There is a need for continuity of collection by waste contractors at a

reasonable price and a better interface between waste contractors and

businesses

2 Messages from Government agencies are perceived to be confusing and

inconsistent. Often, the easiest route is simply to use the bin! People knew

this wasn’t the best environmental option. There is a need for “joined up”

local and national thinking to ensure a consistent and business friendly

service is provided. This should consider effective fiscal incentives

including tax breaks for businesses who recycle. Longer term planning,

beyond the 4/5 years of a political system, towards 40/50 year planning, is

needed.

S

There should be clear and accessible regional waste plans which make

local services more cost effective. Packaging Waste Recovery Note (PRN)

revenues should go to develop local / regional waste handing and

processing facilities. Businesses felt there was little transparency and that

it was just another tax.

3 People’s understanding of waste management – both staff & the public –

is very poor. Effective waste handing, separation and recycling is not a

spontaneous action. Waste education and wider environmental education,

from an early age, is essential

Both

Groups

No additional comments

4 Infrastructure & communication amongst neighbouring businesses is poor Both

74

# Issue S / NS

and could exclude opportunities for cost effective, aggregated collections

by contractors

Groups

There is a need for a co-operative group scheme(s) to pool resources,

aggregate waste & recyclables and negotiate better, cheaper contracts for

waste collection.

Local recycling centres should be opened up to small businesses

5 Legislation is a driver, but is seen in a very negative way. It is perceived to

dump the onus of responsibility on the business without support and

incentives to foster good practice. People felt uniformed or even ignorant

of applicable legislation and that sometimes businesses are penalised for

trying to follow the law.

NS

Legislation needs to be more accessible to small businesses – there was

poor recognition of e.g. NetRegs – with clear and readily available

advice.

Ways to reach people in business included: TV, local radio, local

newspapers, direct mailings, linked to EA inspections and provision of

suitable training materials

6 There is resistance to change working practices at all levels in the

business, from employees to management and often little understanding of

the benefits of effective waste management & recycling

S

Need local “best practise” waste guides e.g. – for local shopping centres

– which include clear expression of the cost benefits of effective waste

management and provision of suitable training materials to support such

guides

7 There is very poor or no understanding of the help and support that exists

at a practical and strategic level. For example several contact details were

exchanged amongst the businesses attending e.g. an organisation that

provides lease cardboard balers and a collection system. One business had

halved its costs in this way.

Both

Groups

There is a need for a comprehensive directory of contractor services. This

should set out services offered including any speciality services, what

materials are collected, when they are or can be collected, pricing

structures, contractor size (or size of business they will serve).

Ideally, this directory should be compiled by a trusted, neutral provider

such as the EA, a public body or Southampton University. The majority

felt web based would be better and more easily updateable. Several

individuals felt it should also be paper based.

S = Previously Surveyed by Southampton University NS = Non surveyed

Full outputs from these workshops are shown in the photo report at the end of this

chapter.

9.2 Workshops 3 & 4 (01 March 2007)

Workshops 3 & 4 set out to seek detailed business feedback on the on - line WasteQuest

questionnaire developed by Southampton University. Using an internet enabled venue

and notebook PCs provided the opportunity for in depth trials of WasteQuest by target

group businesses. Figure 9.2 below shows the opening screen for WasteQuest .

75

Figure 9.2: WasteQuest opening screen

WasteQuest (WQ) was tested in the workshop six times. The following feedback starts

with generic comments from the closing discussions and is followed by more detailed

feedback from each of the six runs of WQ. The points below relate to the closing

discussions following small group work using the on-line questionnaire.

9.2.1 What’s in it for me?

In a real user situation, for example by a local authority to survey waste arisings from

businesses in their area, the relevance and benefit to the business using the WasteQuest

questionnaire (WQ) needs to be much more explicit. Respondents felt that for small and

medium sized businesses to invest time in completing WQ unless they need to gain clear

business benefit from doing so. Payback options might be:

• Completing the WQ allows access to fuller on line help sections of WasteQuest

with support for business, saving them money and helping them maintain

compliance with relevant waste legislation

• Some kind of incentives for completing WQ, for example access to grants or

specialist help

• More quick wins and positive suggestions for improving business performance as

ongoing outputs from working through WQ

• Business focussed feedback – specific outputs for the particular business. It was

felt the output reports beyond the summary of waste data were too generic

76

9.2.2 Time

Respondents felt that WQ should be quick and simple to complete, taking 10 to 30

minutes (maximum). The introduction should say clearly how long it will take to

complete.

9.2.3 Navigation

The user interface is inadequate and must be more robust.

WQ needs the urgent attention of a web designer to:

• Improve the look, feel and usability of WQ. Suggestions were:

o Tell users were they are in WQ – e.g. a progress bar and / or ‘You are at question

14/45’ to provide ‘ light at the end of the tunnel’

o Improve the sub-division of WQ by clearer sections and signposting between

sections. On screen prompt bars and text to say things like ‘You are in section x of

y’; ‘The next section deals with bin types’ etc. Respondents felt this would help in

the process of completing WQ

o Use of the Royal Mail Postcode Address File (PAF) to auto complete and validate

addresses. This is something respondents are very familiar with using other sites

and they expect it here

o Needs a ‘previous’ button in WQ itself, rather relying on Internet Explorer’s back

button.

o Must be able to save and be able to go back later – for example if you have to go

away and find relevant data about bin types or waste volumes. It is important to

users to know the work they have done will not be lost and the whole

questionnaire can be saved for later reference. (Essentially a feature like that

found in on-line insurance sites, which give you a code to be able to pick up the

quote at a later date)

o Some questions need more options in the drop down boxes, for example the

‘daily… yearly’ drop down needs a N/A option. This would enable one off data to

be entered – the example used was 1 respondent who gave a couple of flip chart

pads to a local school as a one off. WQ unable to handle this.

9.2.4 Data entry

The SIC code / business type screens are confusing and unwieldy. The four options up

front didn’t always allow appropriate categorisation and the screens that followed caused

some confusion and time penalty.

Business will need to be aware of the requirement to have hard data to hand before they

start WQ. There is a need for a pre-questionnaire prompt sheet.

9.2.5 Look and feel

Several points are made in specific feedback points below and relate mainly to the screen

shots shown. Generic points are:

• MS Comic is NOT an appropriate font for WQ. Font(s) should be sans serif. There

are protocols available on the web for web design and accessibility.

• A web designer should be engaged to move WQ towards a Beta version

• Some buttons disappear when you go back – e.g. ‘work from home’

77

• Work is needed to fine tune the text into clearer English

9.3 Sub group feedback on the use of the questionnaire

Q1) Do you understand each of the questions?

Garage owner (1st try) Yes

Garage owner (2nd

try) 1st try stuck at 12. hence later 2

nd try

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes

Design House Yes. And what happened if you miss spell e.g. Southampton

up front?

Architect Address screen not clear – needs auto search via post code to

simplify adding this information in

Q2) Are the different business activities clear?

Garage owner (1st try) No

Garage owner (2nd

try) No

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent No

Design House No

Architect Yes

Figure 9.3: Business categories (Q3)

78

Q3) Is it clear which one your business belongs to?

Garage owner (1st try) No – business was a garage but wasn’t at all clear whether

retail or service

Garage owner (2nd

try) No

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent No

Design House Yes – although a great deal of mixed information in ‘Retail &

commerce’ and ‘Service’ which caused some confusion

Architect Yes & challenges to get this right

Also comment that the pop up information box which appears with mouse hover is not

obvious. It was only noticed by accident and when it did open the text was too dense.

Figure 9.4: Adequacy of match (Q4 and 5)

Q4) Did the results find the correct business activity for you?

Garage owner (1st try) No – business was a garage but wasn’t at all clear whether

retail or service

Garage owner (2nd

try) As above

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes

Design House Yes, eventually but not easily for a Design House.

Architect Yes

79

Q5) Was it clear from the results (if there was more than one match) which description

best described your business?

Garage owner (1st try) No – had to go through ALL screens to find garage as it is a

service & repairs business not a retail business

Garage owner (2nd

try) As above

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes – although lists of business types far too dense – hard to

pick out what you are looking for

Design House Yes

Architect Yes – although in questions 7 & 8 of WQ the radio buttons

were not set to default

Figure 9.5: Employment screen (Q6)

Q6) Are the questions on this screen clear, particularly questions 13 and 16?

Garage owner (1st try) Not easy to quantify for small businesses with only a small

number of staff. Average hours / week for each part time staff

person preferable to ‘Total’

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Need to say up front in WQ that it is for SMEs – I put in 400

staff and the questionnaire said ‘no greater value’ which

caused some confusion. There needs to be an option for more

than 1 premises – some medium sized businesses have

multiple sites

Estate Agent Some confusion here in trying to enter the required data on

staff hours

80

Design House Business premises unclear for home working / home office

Move forward buttons not consistent e.g. ‘Next; or ‘Submit’

or ‘Continue’ Why not all the same?

Architect Only full time displayed because only full time had been

entered earlier – no capacity to correct or adjust this.

Floor space - length and breadth is redundant and should

disappear if area is entered.

Figure 9.6: Waste options (Q7-10)

Q7) Is the screen above clear?

Garage owner (1st try) Yes

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes

Design House ?

Architect Contractor 28 / 29 / 30 should read ‘Contractor / Consultant’

81

Q8) Did you understand the options?

Garage owner (1st try) Yes

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent ?

Design House Yes Architect Not sure why the text appears re disposal options

Q9) Were there any other options not listed that were applicable to your business?

(excluding the last option, which allows for this)

Garage owner (1st try) Important issue here of what is and isn’t legal. Taking waste

home or to HWRC may not be legal. Businesses could be

concerned who has access to this information – nothing to

reassure them that what they input is strictly confidential (and

would they believe this anyway?)

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Colours imply a ‘good’ (Green) & ‘bad’ (Red) message

Estate Agent No

Design House 7th question needs to include the words ‘on a regular basis’

Architect Top instruction line not needed

8th question should be moved to ‘waste transfer’ questions

Why is ‘do not know / not sure here’?

‘SUBMIT’ button is sometimes ‘NEXT’ on other screens –

needs consistent language

Q10) Did any of the above questions seem redundant?

Garage owner (1st try) No

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes

Design House ?

Architect Yes – see above

Following this question ‘Thank You’ appeared not correctly

linked and it was not possible to go back to it using the back

key on internet explorer

If the business selects the Local Authority disposal option, then the screen below should

indicate the name of that LA based on the address of the business (see Figure 9.7).

82

Figure 9.7: Disposal options (Q11)

Q11) Did the questionnaire correctly identify the name of your Local Authority?

Garage owner (1st try) No

Garage owner (2nd

try) 2nd

time it found Soton City, said there were two options but

only listed one

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent No

Design House Why doesn’t the earlier post code entry simply auto enter this?

Architect Question needs re-work so it shows the correct authority OR

asks for this to be input from a drop down or similar. What

happens if someone mis-spells e.g. ‘authroities’?

83

Figure 9.8: Removal options (Q12)

Q12) Is it clear what to do for the next three screens? (see Figure 9.8)

Garage owner (1st try) Yes

Then wouldn’t go back to 1st tab once it had moved onto 2

nd

waste route

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Fairly

One of the pages had a yellow section at the top which

confused us. Should this be filled in or was it an example? I

found by accident it had to be filled in but then this wasn’t for

a bin I had entered. Then this information wasn’t carried

forward.

Estate Agent Disposal option who removes your waste drop down didn’t

have name of recycle centre which I expected to be available

from the earlier post code information I had entered

Design House No

Architect No - Not particularly clear

84

Figure 9.9: Bin options (Q13)

Q13) Were you able to select the container that you use from the list provided?

Garage owner (1st try) Yes. Although it wasn’t clear that I needed to enter number of

each type. It felt like there were too many bin options and it

might be better if they were grouped so if wheelie bin is

selected WQ then shows a selection of wheelie bin sizes to

select from i.e. a tiered / layered selecting system in WQ.

Went from this page to ‘Occasional Waste’ skipping all the

bin filling and waste type pages.

If you put ‘Yes’ in for occasional waste it wouldn’t load the

page.

If you tried to go back it ‘forgot’ one of the two disposal

options.

If you put ‘No’ for occasional it went to summary page but no

information was given

WQ locked up here

Garage owner (2nd

try) It is not always clear that you need to scroll to the bottom of

the page(s) to submit your entry information. This needs to be

tidied up here and in several other places.

Engineering consultancy Not easily. WQ did not select the bins I clicked on but

85

selected bigger sizes. I then just guessed the bins

Estate Agent Yes

Design House Needs to say e.g. 120 litre not just 120

Architect Yes

Figure 9.10: Fullness of container (Q14)

Q14) Is the page above clear? Do you understand what you have to do?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) ?

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Number of collections per what? This is not at all clear to user

& didn’t relate to the next button on the right

Design House Needs to allow for a once entry i.e. not just daily weekly etc.

Architect The ‘Submit’ button appears to be at the bottom of the screen

and when there are many items on screen it is not clear how to

move on to the next disposal option.

WQ then jumped forward to screen as Question 25

86

Figure 9.11: Waste types (Q15-20)

Q15) Is it clear what each type of waste is, particularly the sub-categories?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) ?

Engineering consultancy Yes

Estate Agent Yes

Design House Return key produced incomplete screen refresh with ghost

text remaining

Architect n/a

Q16) Did you use the “INFO” buttons?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) ?

Engineering consultancy No

Estate Agent Yes

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

87

Q17) Did they help?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) ?

Engineering consultancy n/a

Estate Agent Listings too dense and confusing. After I had tried one I

couldn’t be bothered with any others – it takes too long to

digest the information.

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

Q18) Did they work OK?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) ?

Engineering consultancy n/a

Estate Agent n/a

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

Q19) Were you able to give a description of the different types of waste in the text boxes?

Q20) If not, why not?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) WEEE not obvious – I didn’t understand the jargon

‘Organics’ is also jargon

Engineering consultancy Difficult to think of all types

I found this confusing as I had just done bin types and I’m

now being asked for waste types. Is this for all bins or just

some of them?

Too much jargon e.g. what is C&D?

Description of materials needs to say ‘optional’

Estate Agent Not tried fully.

But what about plastic office files and folders? Couldn’t find

what to list them as?

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

88

Figure 9.12: Graphical display (Q21)

Q21) Was the graph useful in helping you visualise the volume of each type of waste that

goes into the container you are filling?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Complicated and difficult to assess % of different wastes

Estate Agent Yes

Why not ‘Paper & Card’?

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

89

Figure 9.13: Graphical display (Q22)

Q22) And here:

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy Feels very repetitive, confusing and long winded

Estate Agent ?

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

Figure 9.14: Occasional waste (Q23)

90

Q23) Did you understand what was meant by “occasional” waste, and the two different

types of occasional waste?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) Not clear what the distinction is between regular and

occasional waste is if the later simply goes in the normal bin.

Occasional being more than monthly is not an appropriate

definition. I have regular 3 monthly collection of oil – this is

NOT occasional.

This compounds the challenge in estimating bin types and

volumes

Engineering consultancy n/a

Estate Agent Wouldn’t accept ‘Yes’ and so had to put in ‘No’ to make WQ

move forward.

Partially crashed here and skipped to waste summary

Design House n/a

Architect Waste summary popped up here and was confusing as it felt it

should link to waste awareness section of WQ?

Figure 9.15: Volumes (Q24)

Q24) Was the range of different possible volumes sufficient?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) No – needs to be clearer

Engineering consultancy OK here although mostly done by a contractor so I’ve no idea

what bins they use. Filling out this bin information is far too

complicated if you have lots of different materials

Estate Agent n/a

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

91

Figure 9.16: Volumes - other waste (Q25)

Q25) And, similarly, for this page.

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) Crashed here

Engineering consultancy This is not specific or tailorable enough for my business. I

stopped here and put made up data in as it wouldn’t give me

the options I needed

Estate Agent n/a

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

Figure 9.17: Main waste summary (Q26)

Q26) Did you need to use it because you had made a mistake earlier, or because the result

didn’t look right?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

92

Engineering consultancy Crashed at this screen

Estate Agent n/a

Design House n/a

Architect n/a

Figure 9.18: Waste awareness (Q27)

Q27) Were you able to answer the questions here:

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy

Estate Agent Not easily & I got very muddled with the ‘Please select’ drop

down box.

Design House

Architect No. Needs to be re-formatted to make simpler and more

accessible. This question should come before the summary

screen

As you select from the drop down ‘Please select’ each that

you select should ‘grey out’ so it is clear what you have

selected and what is left to select from.

93

Figure 9.19: Waste summary pie chart (Q28)

Q28) Did the results seem correct?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) n/a

Engineering consultancy n/a

Estate Agent Yes

Design House None of these appeared for me

Architect None of these appeared for me

If you click “YES” on the screen below (Figure 9.20), then select “Instant feedback” on

the next screen, you will be able to see the feedback that the questionnaire provides:

94

Figure 9.20: Completion

You will then see the feedback screen, with a drop-down menu of generated reports.

Figure 9.21: Feedback reports (Q29)

Q29) Is it clear what you should do here?

Garage owner (1st try) n/a

Garage owner (2nd

try) I need a tailored report that is specific and personal to my

needs – for example if WQ finds you are producing a lot of

cardboard it should tell you you are producing ‘x’ tonnes and

why not contact ‘y’ to get it recycled.

Engineering consultancy The advice list is not clear about what is appropriate to each

business. WQ needs to flag up and alert businesses to what

they should be thinking about and how to take appropriate

actions.

95

Estate Agent Not easy to navigate.

Very frustrated at the lack of reports appropriate to estate

agencies – for example it included the Hazardous Waste

Regulations but I don’t produce any hazardous waste and

why the End of Life Vehicles Directive?

Needs to be much better tailored to business to be useful.

Design House Neither gave any result other than ‘The End’

Architect

The comments from this workshop will involve some reformatting of the questionnaire to

take into account the points raised.

96

10. Conclusions

As part of the project the 'smart questionnaire' was re-structured from a format that relied

upon an interviewer operating a self-contained version of the software package to a web-

based format which can be used remotely by anyone with internet access. The current

version of the questionnaire can be found on the WasteQuest website

(www.wastequest.soton.ac.uk) and at the moment can be accessed by the user name and

password. The questionnaire has been completely restructured so that it can now deal

with the whole range of business types, including not only SMEs but also large

companies and institutional bodies. There are a number of improvements that could be

made to the current version of the questionnaire: in particular the error trapping features

could be improved, and cosmetic changes to the appearance would enhance user

experience. These aspects may be further based on the outcome of future user workshops

in which a cross-section of businesses test the format described in this report in a web-

based environment. The questionnaire is working well as an information-gathering

system on waste generation rates.

In the process of broadening the questionnaire to cover a wider range of businesses there

has been considerable enhancement of the databases and tools contained within it. For

example, the search engine developed to identify business SIC codes far exceeds in

performance any other encountered to date (e.g. Biffa website), and has the added

capability of learning new key words automatically from users’ own descriptions of their

activities. Databases for the calculation of weights of waste based on volumes extend

from single source materials to mixed wastes, with and without compaction. Categories

and subcategories for waste and for the processes involved in its generation conform to

the European Waste Catalogue, and a waste classification can be assigned based on user

input. There are also databases on the waste management facilities and infrastructure in

the area (Hampshire in the current version), on types of waste collection receptacle used

by different boroughs within the county, and those used by private waste management

companies operating in the area.

The development of a suite of administrator programmes allows the questionnaire to be

customised for specific users (e.g. waste collection authorities, disposal authorities, waste

management companies, consultants). This facility allows the use of a web-based system

to modify the embedded databases rather than relying on providing written guidelines for

potential users. These administration pages allow the user (without any programming

skills) to be able to customise the questionnaire to his/her own geographical region, local

circumstances and type of survey being undertaken. This will allow the questionnaire to

be rolled out to a much wider audience by those experienced in waste management, but

not necessarily experienced computer programmers.

Databases for the resource recovery infrastructure in terms of the types and sizes of the

facilities – from landfills to individual bring banks – with geographical coordinates for

use in the GIS have been developed. The databases required to convert postcodes to

geographical coordinates so that businesses can also be included are embedded in the

questionnaire. A layered GIS format using the Google Earth mapping system has been

used which gives flexibility and is simpler to set up for new users than the approach

initially envisaged. It also has the advantage that it will allow expansion of the system to

other users without the need for purchase of software licence agreements.

97

The research carried out in the development of the software incorporated a survey using

the 'smart questionnaire' in an interviewer-based exercise of SMEs in the construction

industry. The survey had a dual purpose: to gain data from this key sector on waste

generation rates, and also to seek opinion as to the usefulness of the questionnaire, its

format and how close it was to being suitable for use in self-assessment mode. The work

involved building up a database of companies across Hampshire within this sector;

selection of a broad cross-section of these; and employing a team of interviewers to

undertake site visits. It was originally planned to carry out this survey work in

conjunction with Hampshire County Council's Natural Resources team, with the aim of

complementing their work on the development of locally-based resource recovery parks.

This was not possible, however, due to changes in the structure of the County Council

team and the loss of key members of their staff.

The results of the survey were processed by the Open University and evaluated to the

extent that the data would allow based on the number of respondents. Estimates were

made of the likely amount and composition of wastes from SMEs in this sector. It was

recognised that amounts of waste produced from the micro businesses in particular were

difficult to capture in the survey, due to cross contamination of the data with unknown

amounts of waste going into the MSW stream where businesses were operating at

domestic properties rather than at commercial premises. Overall recycling rates were

generally low for all wastes produced by SMEs in this sector, although some individual

businesses did achieve very high levels of recycling. Building construction businesses

produced more than twice the amount of waste per employee compared to building

installation (e.g. electrical, plumbing) or completion (e.g. painting, glazing).

Construction waste – predominantly (90%) mixed building materials and refurbishment

waste – accounted for just under half the waste material produced of which an estimated

average of just over 40% was recycled.

The major concern, which was identified at the beginning of the work as the biggest risk

in not meeting the objectives, related to the need for the active participation and

cooperation of business in the trials of the questionnaire. To engage business on a large

scale has proved to be extremely difficult and even when rewards were offered, as in the

case of focus groups and workshops, business proved less than enthusiastic. There has

been a general reluctance by business to participate in the research and recruiting willing

participants has involved considerable effort, often very frustrating, in establishing

databases of contacts and systematically working through these. As a result the waste

audit data collected from business has been sparser than originally anticipated. The

quantitative data set from the construction sector is only of restricted value and skewed

due to lack of participation by certain groups within that sector. We do not have sufficient

data to make a quantitative assessment of the results generated through self assessment

procedures: this is partly due to the time taken to get the system up and running but also

to the unwillingness of business to participate. Analysis of user comment provided

valuable feedback on the usability of the questionnaire, however, and a great deal was

also learnt from analysis of the data collected in the survey to improve the wording and

approach of the questions.

A user workshop was held early on in the project and involved a mixture of business

groups. The workshop explored the mechanisms that might best be adopted to engage the

business community in self assessment of their waste management activities. It sought to

98

discover what businesses thought were the key waste management issues, what they

understood regarding waste management and environmental regulations, and whether

they were aware of recycling opportunities in their area. It looked at these issues from the

perspective of providing an incentive to participate in waste audit. In many respects the

survey was looking at the best ways in which businesses could gain direct benefit from

participation.

As a result of the workshop a series of user information feedback sheets were prepared

and incorporated into a newly developed feedback section of the questionnaire. These can

again be edited or added to via the administrator web pages, allowing the system to be

kept up to date. Information about local recycling opportunities can also be provided. The

mechanism to give feedback on the waste management performance of the business is

also built in but is currently not activated as there is insufficient data on SME waste upon

which to establish at present a reliable yardstick.

The second user workshop concentrated on end user response to the self assessment

questionnaire. This addressed issues of usability of the questionnaire, satisfaction with the

feedback provided, format of the questions, layout and reliability. To take the

questionnaire to a web based format, including all the additional features whilst at the

same time making it applicable across the entire commercial and industrial sectors, was a

much bigger job than originally anticipated. It has been an iterative and continuously

evolving process, and one which will continue to evolve as long as there is a

questionnaire. Reaching the point of trialling the questionnaire against a broad cross-

section of business users was therefore somewhat delayed. The workshop revealed that

the questionnaire is still not perfect: there are sections where clearer user instructions are

needed, there is some repetition in the information sought, and the ordering of

information gathering is not ideal for every circumstance. Many of the comments made

by users were incorporated into the final software version of the questionnaire. Others

require the development of a professional web-interface that is both easier to use and

more robust, and which is beyond the scope of this research project. This could build on

the work done in both the design of the questionnaire and the administrator pages,

enabling the tool to be more widely adopted and used. Our general conclusion is,

however, that the research has developed a working and usable version of the

questionnaire which forms the basis for continual improvement.

99

11. Dissemination

By its very nature the project has involved direct dissemination to a key segment of the

target audience, through distribution of the 'smart questionnaire' in a promotional CD

which was launched at the CIWM exhibition in Torbay in June 2006. A web page was

established early on in the project (www.wastequest.soton.ac.uk) which currently hosts

the web based version of the questionnaire. It has been too early to consider roll out of the

audit tool but this could now be taken by organisations such as Regional Development

Agencies, the Environment Agency and Local Government and adapted for their own

purposes in gathering data to aid in policy making and implementation of a resource

recovery strategy. It is hoped that the report from this project will be made available to

other interested groups in local and regional government, business and regulatory bodies

by Defra.

The current website will be maintained while the questionnaire goes through a period of

further evaluation by some of the project participants and supporters (e.g. Hampshire

County Council, Southampton City Council, SEEDA). The questionnaire itself has been

designed so that each central promoter (i.e. each organisation using it to gather data from

users of the questionnaire) has control over the content they wish to use for the purposes

of audit or information provision. It was never intended that the research provider should

give an ongoing support service for an indefinite duration. The program has been

designed to allow each central promoter to customise, populate and update to fit their own

regional or application needs: this is part of the fundamental 'smart' nature of the

questionnaire. As an example, if a district council wishes to use the software simply as a

facilities locator, it can accurately reference the position of its recycling banks, HWRCs,

transfer stations, landfill sites etc, and input details of the materials accepted at each site,

site opening hours, and any other relevant information. Similarly it can identify which

local recycling companies deal with which materials, as well as including details of its

own collection services. Feedback documents can be chosen from the inbuilt generic

lists, but these can also be updated and customised by the addition of locally-relevant

materials provide by the central promoter. In other words, a central promoter can take

complete ownership of its version of the site and ensure that it is updated to meet its own

organisational needs, whether for information provision or audit purposes. It should be

noted, however, that the questionnaire and the WasteQuest website have not been

assessed for accessibility under the Disability and Discrimination Act. The output as it is

at present was not intended as a commercial piece of software but was developed as a

platform to explore ideas for information gathering for the purposes of waste audit. It is

possible that this beta version could be refined to a commercial product, but this may be

better undertaken by commercial developers who can enhance the appearance of the user

screens whilst maintaining the underlying logic and programming structure. Whilst the

questionnaire was used and trialled as described in this report, further modifications are

pending: the questionnaire is thus subject to ongoing revision building on the feedback

received and summarised in the report. Potential users should therefore contact the

project team for updated information from that presented herein.

There are two main ways in which roll-out of ownership of the questionnaire could be

achieved. The first is by providing potential promoters with template webpages and

administration software that allows them to put this material on their own websites. The

second approach, which is likely to be more valuable in terms of information gained, is to

100

host the entire package on a central website as at present, but to allow each promoter to

register with password protection and maintain their own part of the central site. In this

way all of the audit data gathered is accessible in one location for further study. This

could be hosted on the Defra website, the Environment Agency website or through

another independent organisation willing to maintain a central record.

Since the project started there has been a very large shift in emphasis in the UK from

waste disposal to resource recovery, and increased recognition that a large proportion of

that resource lies within the commercial and industrial sector. There is already

considerable recovery of resource from this sector, but mainly from large companies

through privately managed contracts. Recovery from SMEs is less well developed and the

Waste Strategy 2007 has emphasised the need to deal with this waste more effectively,

possibly by co-processing with MSW. The audit tool developed within this research could

make a contribution towards this by providing local authorities with a means of capturing

the data necessary for their facilities and infrastructure planning.

101

12. References and Bibliography

12.1 Reference cited in the text

AEAT (2003) The Composition of Municipal Solid Waste in Wales: a report for the Welsh

Assembly Government AEA Technology, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, UK

Brass (2005) Commercial and Industrial Waste Survey 2003 Business Relationships,

Accountability, Sustainability and Society Centre, Cardiff University’;

www.brass.cf.ac.uk/projects/05Waste_Commercial_and_Industrial_Waste_Survey_20

03_Outputs.html

CE and AEAT (2003) The benefits of greener business, Cambridge Econometrics and

AEA Technology (www.environment-agency.gov.uk/business)

Curry R (2005) SEPA Pilot Survey of Industrial and Commercial Waste Production in

Scotland: Final Report to SEPA, EnviroCentre, Glasgow, UK

Defra (2004) Waste Composition Analysis: Guidance For Local Authorities 2004

produced by Entec UK Ltd and Eunomia Research and Consulting for the Waste

Implementation Programme, Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs,

London UK

Defra (2006) Review of England’s Waste Strategy: A consultation Document,

(www.defra.gov.uk)

DOE (1994) The Technical Aspects of Controlled Waste Management, The National

Household Waste Analysis Project - Phase 2 Volume 1 Report on Composition and

Weight Data Report No: CWM/082/94, Department of the Environment, London, UK.

DOE (1994) The Technical Aspects of Controlled Waste Management – Research Report,

The National Household Waste Analysis Project - Phase 2 Report on Further

Composition & Weight Data Report No: CWM/086/94, Department of the

Environment, London, UK

EA (2000) Strategic Waste Management Assessment 2000: South East The Environment

Agency, Bristol, UK and www.environment-agency,gov.uk; also assessments for other

regions of England and Wales and overall summary data

EA (2002) NetRegs Benchmarking Survey of Environmental Awareness 2002 The

Environment Agency, (www.netregs.gov.uk)

EA (2004) personal communication with S. Pocock, The Environment Agency, Bristol,

UK

EA (2005) Commercial and Industrial Waste Survey 2002/3, available on:

www.environmentagency,gov.uk/subjects/waste

EA (2005) Environment Agency Waste Survey web tools available on

www.environment-agency.gov.uk/subjects/waste/

EA (2005) SME-nvironment 2005: A review of changing environmental attitudes and

behaviours among small and medium sized businesses in the UK, NetRegs,

Environment Agency, (www.netregs.gov.uk)

Frater, L (2004) Cardiff Retail Survey 2003/2004 conducted by BRASS and Keep Wales

Tidy, (www.brass.cf.ac.uk)

HCC (2005) ‘More from Less: How to make Better use of Hampshire’s Material

Resources - A Stakeholder Perspective’ Hampshire County Council, UK

Hunter H and Jordan P (2001a) ‘The National Waste Production Survey Estimating

Methodology’ Hadley Hunter Ltd, London UK for the Environment Agency

Hunter H and Jordan P (2001b) Analysis of the National Waste Survey: Final report

(fourth draft) Report for the Environment Agency, Hadley Hunter Limited, London

102

Knapp D and VanDeventer M (1999) The Twelve Master Categories of Recyclable

Materials, Urban Ore Inc, California, USA available from

http://www.grrn.org/zerowaste/

LGA (2005) Local government- naturally resourceful, Leading the way to better use of

material resources, Local Government Association consultation,

(www.lga.gov.uk/Documents/Briefing/Our_Work/Environment/waste/material.pdf)

Lisney B, Riley K and Banks C (2003) From Waste to Resources Management: a

discussion paper Hampshire Natural Resource Initiative, Hampshire County Council,

Hampshire, UK

McLaurin I, Darby P and Raeside R (2006) Estimation of commercial and industrial

waste produced in Scotland in 2004: Final report by Napier University for the Scottish

Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), UK

MEL (1993) West Midlands Waste Management Coordinating Authority: Industrial Waste

Survey, Birmingham, UK

MEL (1999) ‘Quantities and composition of industrial and commercial waste generated

in Surrey’ Report for Surrey County Council, MEL Research Ltd, Birmingham UK

Murray R (2002) Zero Waste Greenpeace Environmental Trust, London, UK; available

from www.greenpeace.org.uk/trust

Oxfordshire CC (2005) Are Oxfordshire’s Businesses Waste Aware? Oxfordshire County

Council Trade Waste Survey 2005, Oxford, UK

Padelopoulos, G (2003) ‘Andover Resource Project Pilot: Report’ The Environment

Centre, Southampton, UK

Parfitt, J (2002) ‘Analysis of household waste composition and factors driving waste

increases’ WRAP for the Strategy Unit, Government Cabinet Office, London

Project Integra (1999) Project Integra Kerbside and Household Waste Recycling Centre

Waste Analysis and Questionnaire Survey Results. Report from MEL Research Ltd for

the Project Integra Household Waste Research Programme, Hampshire County

Council, UK

SLR (2005) Delivering Key Waste Management Infrastructure: Lessons Learned from

Europe, SLR Consulting Ltd for CIWM, Final Report, (www.ciwm.co.uk/pma/2197)

SWAP (2005) Food and drink waste in the Yorkshire and Humber Region Executive

summary Report prepared for Yorkshire Forward by SWAP, Leeds, UK

Thomas et al (2007) Identification of Key Resources Streams in Commercial and

Industrial Waste from Small Businesses in the Food Sector’ The Open University’s

Integrated Waste Systems Research Group and The University of Southampton, The

Open University, Milton Keynes

Thomas, C (2004) ‘Public Attitudes and Behaviour in Western Riverside’ Report for

Waste Watch from The Open University’s Integrated Waste Systems Research Group

and MORI Social Research Institute, The Open University, Milton Keynes

Whittaker D, Sowerby C and Schiavi I (2004) ‘Comprehensive Waste Audit of

Staffordshire, Stoke-on-Trent and the Surrounding Areas: Final Report’ Viridis;

available from www.viridis.co.uk

WS Atkins (2003) NetRegs - SME-nvironment 2003. A survey to assess environmental

behaviours among smaller UK businesses, The Environment Agency,

http://www.environmentagency.gov.uk/commondata/acrobat/smenvironment_uk_2003.

pdf

12.2. Sources consulted for statistical data and business information

Inter-Departmental Business Register: www.statistics.gov.uk/idbr

103

Small Business Service: www.sbs.gov.uk

Office of National Statistics: www.statistics.gov.uk

Environment Agency: www.environment-agency.gov.uk

NetRegs, Environment Agency: www.netregs.gov.uk

Envirowise: www.environwise.gov.uk

FAME, Companies House data on UK and Irish businesses http://fame.bvdep.com

Yellow Pages or Yell.com, http://www.yell.com

HCC (2004) Hampshire Business Directory Hampshire County Council, UK

White H (2005) Research into Business Types in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight for

Hampshire and Isle of Wight Sustainable Business Partnership, Hampshire, UK

ONS (2003) UK Standard Industrial Classification of Economic Activities 2003, Volumes

1+2, The Stationary Office, London, UK

EA (2002) European Waste Catalogue: Amended and Consolidated Version The

Environment Agency, Bristol, UK

12.3. Other literature reviewed

Apotheker S (1995) Making the big jump in commercial recycling, one small business at a

time Resource Recycling 14 pp 16 -26

Bacot H, McCoy B, Plagman-Galvin J (2002) Municipal Commercial Recycling: Barriers

to Success, American Review of Public Administration, 32 #2, pp 145-65

Biffaward (2006) The Mass Balance Movement: The definitive reference for resource

flows within the UK environmental economy Biffaward, Nottinghamshire, UK

Cameron-Beaumont C and Bridgewater E (2002) ‘Trade Waste Input into Civic Amenity

Sites’ Western Partnership for Sustainable Development and Network Recycling, UK

DTI (2003) ‘Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment – Annual Report

2003’ Department of Trade and Industry /Pub 6916/3k/10//NP. URN 03/1339, UK

EA (2004) ‘Waste Minimization for Industry’ The Environment Agency; available from

www.environment-agency.gov.uk

Ecosys (2003) Taking Stock: managing our impact An ecological footprint of the South

East region, prepared by Ecosys Environmental Management and Education,

Stockholm Environment Institute at York University, Centre for Urban and Regional

Ecology (CURE) at Manchester University, Centre for Environmental Strategy at

University of Surrey, for Biffaward, Nottinghamshire, UK

Enviros (2005) Best Practice Guidance: Trade Waste Recycling for Waste Strategy

Support, Greater London Authority, London UK

Envirowise (1999) Waste Account: Count the cost of waste for your business – and

measure your savings Environmental Technology Best Practice Programme Guide

ET225, http://www.envirowise.gov.uk

European Environment Agency (EEA) (2004) ‘Case studies on waste minimization

practices in Europe’ Topic Report, 2/2002, EEA, Copenhagen

Hinshaw J (1991) Targeting Commercial Businesses for Recycling Resource Recycling pp

27-32

Jackson, T, 2004 ‘Motivating Sustainable Consumption: a review of evidence on

consumer behaviour and behaviour change’ Report to the Sustainable Development

Research Network, London, UK

Knapp DL and Van Deventer ML (2001). Envisioning Resource Recovery Parks: Twelve

Strategic Imperatives. Urban Ore Inc, USA.

104

KPMG, 2004 ‘Recycling at home more popular than at work: Results of a YouGov survey

for KPMG’ Business Europe article available electronically at:

http://www.businesseurope.com/newsfeed/document?id=BEP1_News_0000065961

Maclaren VW and Chang-Ching Yu (1997) ‘Solid waste Recycling Behaviour of

Industrial – Commercial – Industrial Establishments’ Growth and Change, 28 pp 93-

109

Peters M & Kerry Turner R. (2004) SME Environmental Attitudes and Participation in

Local-scale Voluntary Initiatives: Some Practical Applications Journal of Environmental

Planning and Management, 47, # 3, pp449–473

Recoup (2005) Recycling Zone: 2nd Interim Report, for WRAP, Banbury, UK Rosenblum

Jill McDonald's Sweden - Case Study The Natural Step

Stevens B (1994) The cost of commercial recycling collection Resource Recycling, pp 33

– 8

Stevens B (1995) Targeting Business Categories Biocycle, 36 pp 61 – 2 Todd M and

Hawkins

Waste Watch (2001) ‘Rethinking waste management to reap rewards: minimizing waste

for business benefit’ Waste Watch for the Biffaward Programme on Sustainable

Resource Use, London UK

Yoxon M (1999) ‘Managing Waste – A business guide’ The Open University, Milton

Keynes UK

105

13. Appendices:

Appendix 1: Waste Categories and Sub-categories

Main Waste List:

Code Description

CON CONSTRUCTION AND DEMOLITION

CONE Excavation waste

COND Dredging/tailing waste

CONB Building materials and refurbishment waste (not listed elsewhere)

WOO WOOD

WOON Wood which has not been painted or treated

WOOT Wood which has been painted or treated

WOOC Laminated wood or MDF

MET METALS

PAKK Steel cans and other ferrous packaging which did not contain hazardous

material

PAKH Steel cans and other ferrous packaging which contained hazardous material

METP Ferrous metal from production processes

METF Other ferrous metals

PAKA Aluminium cans and other non-ferrous packaging which did not contain

hazardous material

PAKX Aluminium cans and other non-ferrous packaging which contained hazardous

material

META Non-ferrous process waste

METB Other non-ferrous metals

METZ Metal furnishings (not electrical)

GLA GLASS

PAKG Glass bottles and jars

GLAZ Glass which is not packaging

GLAC Ceramic waste (including sanitary ware)

WEE ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONICS

WEEW White electrical goods (cookers, washing machines etc)

WEEL Large electronic equipment

WEET Televisions and computer screens

WEEZ Electrical equipment including fluorescent light bulbs

CHE CHEMICALS

CHEB Organic chemicals

CHED Inorganic chemicals

CHEV Paint or varnish

CHEP Batteries (not car or industrial batteries or accumulators)

CHEA Car or industrial batteries, or accumulators

CHEE Vehicle or plant engine oil

CHEO Other oils (not vehicle or food oil)

CHEC Clinical type waste (including sanitary wastes)

CHEZ Other potentially hazardous wastes including plasterboard or asbestos

106

PLA PLASTICS

PAKD Plastic bottles, tubs and other types of hard plastic packaging

PLAD Hard plastic which is not used for packaging

PAKF Plastic bags, sacks and wrappers

PLAF Film or thin plastic which is not used for packaging

PAKE Foam trays and polystyrene used for packaging

PLAZ Mixed types of plastic not used for packaging

PLAX Any plastic which contained hazardous materials (chemicals, plaster etc)

PAP PAPER AND CARDBOARD

PAPN Newspapers

PAPG Magazines, flyers and brochures

PAPO Office type paper

PAKP Envelopes, paper bags and other paper used for packaging

PAPZ Other paper and soiled paper other than plaster bags

PAPX Plaster bags

PAKB Cardboard boxes and packaging

PAKC Cartons (not liquid) and thin card packaging

PAPC Card not used for packaging

PAKL Liquid cartons

FUR FURNITURE AND FLOORING

FURC Carpets and underlay

FURF Furniture (not metal)

FURZ Small items of office furniture (not electrical)

ORG SOIL, VEGETATION OR ANIMAL-BASED WASTE

ORGC Waste containing no meat (including slurries)

ORGM Waste with meat (including slurries)

ORGA Animal based oils and fats

ORGV Vegetable oils and fats

ORGP Garden type waste

ORGS Soils and composts (not contaminated) other than excavation waste

ORGX Contaminated soils

ORGZ Other types of plant or animal-based waste

TEX TEXTILES

TEXN Cotton, wool and other natural cloth and clothing

TEXS Synthetic types of cloth and clothing

TEXF Footwear

UNC ANY OTHER TYPE OF WASTE

UNCM Mixed general waste

UNCZ Waste not listed anywhere else

107

Occasional Waste List:

Code Description

CON CONSTRUCTION AND DEMOLITION

CONE Excavation waste

COND Dredging/tailing waste

CONB Building materials and refurbishment waste (not listed elsewhere)

WOO WOOD

WOON Wood which has not been painted or treated

WOOT Wood which has been painted or treated

WOOC Laminate wood or MDF

MET METALS

METZ Metal furnishings (not electrical)

PAKK Steel cans and other ferrous packaging which did not contain hazardous

material

PAKH Steel cans and other ferrous packaging which contained hazardous material

METF Other ferrous metals

PAKA Aluminium cans and other non-ferrous packaging which did not contain

hazardous material

PAKX Aluminium cans and other non-ferrous packaging which contained hazardous

material

METB Other non-ferrous metals

GLA GLASS

PAKG Glass bottles and jars

GLAZ Glass which is not packaging

GLAC Ceramic waste (including sanitary ware)

WEE ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONICS

WEEW White electrical goods (cookers, washing machines etc)

WEEL Large electronic equipment

WEET Televisions and computer screens

WEEZ Electrical equipment including fluorescent light bulbs

CHE CHEMICALS

CHEB Organic chemicals

CHED Inorganic chemicals

CHEV Paint or varnish

CHEP Batteries (not car or industrial batteries or accumulators)

CHEA Car or industrial batteries, or accumulators

CHEE Vehicle or plant engine oil

CHEO Oil (not vehicle or food oil)

CHEC Clinical type waste (including sanitary and nappy waste)

CHEZ Other potentially hazardous wastes including plasterboard or asbestos

PLA PLASTICS

PAKD Plastic bottles, tubs and other types of hard plastic packaging

PLAD Hard plastic which is not used for packaging

PAKF Plastic bags, sacks and wrappers

PLAF Film or thin plastic which is not used for packaging

PAKE Foam trays and polystyrene used for packaging

PLAZ Mixed types of plastic not used for packaging

108

PLAX Any plastic which contained hazardous materials (chemicals, plaster etc)

PAP PAPER AND CARDBOARD

PAPN Newspapers

PAPG Magazines, flyers and brochures

PAPO Office type paper

PAKP Envelopes, paper bags and other paper used for packaging

PAPZ Other paper and soiled paper other than plaster bags

PAPX Plaster bags

PAKB Cardboard boxes and packaging

PAKC Cartons (not liquid) and thin card packaging

PAPC Card not used for packaging

PAKL Liquid cartons

FUR FURNITURE AND FLOORING

FURC Carpets and underlay

FURF Furniture (not metal)

FURZ Small items of office furniture (not electrical)

ORG SOIL, VEGETATION OR ANIMAL-BASED WASTE

ORGP Garden type waste

ORGS Soils and composts (not contaminated) other than excavation waste

ORGX Contaminated Soils

ORGZ Other types of plant or animal-based waste

TEX TEXTILES

TEXN Cotton, wool and other natural cloth and clothing

TEXS Synthetic types of cloth and clothing

TEXF Footwear

UNC ANY OTHER TYPE OF WASTE

UNCM Mixed general waste

UNCZ Waste not listed anywhere else

109

Appendix 2: Business details section flow sheet (including list of

business sectors)

a Agriculture, hunting and forestry

b Fishing

c Mining, quarrying, oil and gas

d Manufacturing and publishing

e Electricity, gas and water supply

f Construction and building related professions

g Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles, motorcycles and personal

and household goods

h Hotels and restaurants

i Transport of passengers and goods, cargo handling, storage and travel agents

j Post and telecommunications

k Banking, insurance and other financial activities

l Real estate, property development and renting

m Rentals and hire

n Computer related activities

o Research and development

p Legal profession, accounting, market research, public relations and

management activities

q Holding company

r Architecture, planning, surveying, engineering and technical testing

s Advertising

t Personnel recruitment

u Investigation or security

v Cleaning

w Other commercial business activities

x Public administration and defence; compulsory social security

y Education

z Health (including veterinary) and social work

1a Sewage, refuse or sanitation

1b Membership organisations

1c Recreation, sports and culture

1d Other community, social and personal service activities

1e Private households employing staff and production activities for own use

1f Extra-territorial organisations and bodies

110

Appendix 3: Feedback Documents

ID Number Name

ID1 Waste containment and Health and Safety Issues

ID2 Health and Safety Issues and where to find transporters

ID3 Commercial Waste Regulations

ID4 Waste Licensing Regulations

ID5 Waste Carrier Licensing

ID6 Waste transfer notes and licensing

ID7 Waste Auditing

ID8 Waste Expenditure

ID9 Formal Environmental Management Systems

ID10 Environmental Management Systems overview

ID11 Environmental Policy

ID12 Business Environmental Groups

ID13 Legislation Overview

ID14 Environmental Protection Act

ID15 Duty of Care

ID16 Controlled Waste Regulations

ID17 Landfill Regulations

ID18 Packaging Regulations

ID19 Producer Responsibility (Packaging) Regulations

ID20 Waste Management Licensing Regulations

ID21 Hazardous Waste Regulations

ID22 Construction (Design and Management) Regulations

ID23 Control of Pollution Act

ID24 End of Life Vehicles Directive

ID25 Transfrontier Shipment of Wastes

ID26 Other Waste initiatives

ID27 Other Water initiatives

ID28 Other Air initiatives

ID29 Other regulations or initiatives

ID30 Chemicals CHE

ID31 Organic chemicals CHEB

ID32 Inorganic chemicals CHED

ID33 Paint and varnishes CHEV

ID34 Portable batteries CHEP

ID35 Automotive and industrial batteries and accumulators CHEA

ID36 Engine Oil CHEE

ID37 Other oil (non cooking) CHEO

ID38 Clinical or healthcare risk waste CHEC

ID39 Other potentially hazardous CHEZ

ID40 Other chemicals CHEQ

ID41 Construction and Demolition CON

ID42 C&D excavation CONE

ID43 C&D dredgings and tailings COND

ID44 C&D building materials CONB

ID45 C&D other CONZ

ID46 C&D other (contaminated) CONX

ID47 Electrical and electronic goods WEEE

111

ID48 White goods WEEW

ID49 Large electronic goods WEEL

ID50 TVs and monitors WEET

ID51 Other WEEE WEEZ

ID52 Hazardous WEEE WEEX

ID53 Other WEEE (not hazardous) WEEQ

ID54 Furniture and furnishings FUR

ID55 Carpet/underlay/linoleum FURC

ID56 Furniture FURF

ID57 Other furnishings and non-electrical office equipment FURZ

ID58 Other furniture and flooring FURQ

ID59 Glass GLA

ID60 Glass bottles and jars PAKG

ID61 Other glass GLAZ

ID62 Ceramics GLAC

ID63 Contaminated glass and ceramics GLAX

ID64 Metals MET

ID65 Ferrous packaging PAKK

ID66 Ferrous process waste METP

ID67 Ferrous non-process waste METF

ID68 Non-ferrous packaging PAKA

ID69 Non ferrous process waste META

ID70 Non ferrous non-process waste METB

ID71 Metal furnishings and non-electrical office equipment METZ

ID72 Ferrous packaging (contaminated) PAKH

ID73 Non-ferrous packaging (contaminated) PAKX

ID74 Organics ORG

ID75 Food waste not contaminated by or containing fish or meat ORGC

ID76 Food waste contaminated by or containing fish or meat ORGM

ID77 Animal oils and fats ORGA

ID78 Vegetable oils and fats ORGV

ID79 Park and garden waste including plant matter ORGP

ID80 Soils and composts ORGS

ID81 Any other type of plant or animal material ORGZ

ID82 Contaminated soils ORGX

ID83 Paper and Card PAP

ID84 Newsprint PAPN

ID85 Glossy print/magazines PAPG

ID86 Office paper PAPO

ID87 Packaging paper PAKP

ID88 Non-packaging paper and contaminated paper PAPZ

ID89 Corrugated board/board packaging PAKB

ID90 Carton/thin board/card packaging PAKC

ID91 Non-packaging card PAPC

ID92 Liquid cartons PAKL

ID93 Other paper (hazardous contamination) PAPH

ID94 Plaster bags PAPX

ID95 Plastics PLA

ID96 Packaging dense plastic PAKD

ID97 Non-packaging dense plastic PLAD

112

ID98 Packaging Film Plastic PAKF

ID99 Non-packaging film plastic PLAF

ID100 Expanded plastic PAKE

ID101 Other plastics and mixed plastics PLAZ

ID102 Other plastics (contaminated) PLAX

ID103 Textiles TEX

ID104 Textiles predominantly natural fibres TEXN

ID105 Textiles predominantly synthetic fibres TEXS

ID106 Shoes TEXF

ID107 Textiles (contaminated) TEXX

ID108 Other textiles TEXZ

ID109 Unclassified UNC

ID110 Mixed general waste UNCM

ID111 Other material not classified elsewhere UNCZ

ID112 Other material (contaminated) UNCX

ID113 Wood WOO

ID114 Natural wood untreated WOON

ID115 Natural wood chemically treated WOOT

ID116 Composite wood WOOC

ID117 Wood (contaminated) WOOX

ID118 Other wood WOOZ

113

Appendix 4: Example of programming to include additional

business groups

Page 1 ref Business type Check box

1 Are you self employed or a sole trader?

2 Are you a private limited company?

3 Are you a public limited company?

4 Are you a public organisation?

5 Are you a partnership?

6 Are you a charity or association?

Note: at present we do not think an 'other' category is needed, but inclusion of an

additional database column allows for the possibility of adding this in the future; e.g.

'Other (specify)'.

Business description describe your business activity

Major group Check box

Manufacturing

Service

etc

SIC code finder loop

Business description correct not correct

Page 2 (of this note)

If (ref 7 is YES) and (ref 8 is NO) go to page 3

If (ref 7 is NO) and (ref 8 is YES) go to page 4

If (ref 7 is YES) and (ref 8 is YES) go to page 5

If (ref 7 is NO) and (ref 8 is NO) go to page 6

Page 3 - full time employees

ref Employees

7 Do you employ full time staff Yes No

8 Do you employ part time staff Yes No

114

9 Number of full time employees number

10 Normal working week (hours) number

Store answers in database and go to page 6

Page 4 - part time employees 11 Employed all year round

12 number of employees number

13 total hours per week

(add together the hours worked by

each part time employee)

hours

14 Employed on a seasonal basis number of employees number

15 Number of weeks in the year

employed

number

16 total hours per week

(add together the hours worked by

each seasonal employee)

hours

Store answers in database and go to page 6

Page 5 FULL TIME

9 Number of full time employees number

10 Normal working week (hours) number

PART TIME

11 Employed all

year round

12 number of employees number

13 total part time hours per week

(add together the hours worked by each part time

employee)

hours

14 Employed on a

seasonal basis

number of employees number

15 Number of weeks in the year employed number

16 total hours per week

(add together the hours worked by each seasonal

employee)

hours

Store answers in database and go to page 6

Premises

Page 6 18 Do you own, lease or rent business premises? yes/no

If (ref 18 is NO) and (ref 7 is NO) and (ref 8 is NO) go to page 7a

115

If (ref 18 is NO) and ((ref 7 is YES) or (ref 8 is YES)) and (the business

sector is not in a, b, h, a4) go to page 7a

If (ref 18 is NO) and ((ref 7 is YES) or (ref 8 is YES)) and (the business

sector is in a, b, h, a4) go to page 7b

If (ref 18 is YES) go to page 10

Page 7a 19 If you work at home

or from your home do

you:

20 Have dedicated space for work yes/no

21 Have dedicated storage space yes/no

If (ref 20 is YES) or (ref 21 is YES) then go to page 10

Else go to page 8

Page 7b 20a Does your residence form part of your business

premises? e.g. farm, hotel, guest house, lodge,

pub, care home or similar tied homes

no

yes Specify: ____________

20b Do you have separate waste collection facilities

for your business activity?

Yes/no

22 Does your business activity generate any waste

which you dispose of alongside your household

waste?

yes/no

Store answer to 20a

If (ref 20b is YES) go to page (waste audit page)

If (ref 20b is NO) and (ref 22 is NO) go to page 9

If (ref 20b is NO) and (ref 22 is YES) then go to page (household waste

page)?

Page 8 22 Does your business activity generate any waste which you

dispose of at home alongside your household waste?

yes/no

23 Does your business activity generate any waste which you

dispose of outside of your home?

yes/no

If (ref 22 is NO) and (ref 23 is NO) go to page 9

If (ref 22 is YES) and (ref 23 is NO) go to page (household waste page)

If (ref 23 is YES) then go to page 11

Page 9

Thank you for participating in Waste Quest

116

Page 10 24 Area of business space

25 Area for waste storage

26 Shared areas

27 Do you carry out work away from your business premises yes/no

Store information and then if (the business is in groups a, b, c, f, r, v, x) or

(Ref 27 is YES) go to page 11.

Else go to page (waste audit page)

Page 11 28 Do you act as a contractor yes/no

29 Do you act as a sub-contractor yes/no

30 Do you employ sub-contractors for any of your business activities yes/no

Store information and then go to page (waste audit page)

117

Appendix 5: Programmes for workshops and focus groups

A1. Sample programme

Integrated systems for practical recovery of non MSW waste streams

EXPLORING BUSINESS PERCEPTIONS: OBJECTIVES PROGRAMME &

KEY QUESTIONS (NB: This is for our use & we’d do a summary version for businesses)

Objectives

Gain an insight into business perspectives of the issues of:

• what are the business needs?

• integration of C&I waste management into existing infrastructures

• how best to raise awareness in an action oriented way

• how to communicate with businesses and what to communicate

• incentives & other triggers for change

Need to decide on pre event materials

Programme for max. 3 hour session with up to 20 businesses (recruit 24)

Run

time

Mins. What Who

07:30 45 We arrive & set up room – café style Us

08:15 15 Participants arrive – refreshments available Jurys

08:30 10 Welcome, why we are here, where we want to get to by 11:15 &

handover to facilitator

AM/MY

08:40 10 Agenda overview; housekeeping; ground rules MY

08:50 05 Waste – key business issues

Short & snappy overview

?

08:55 30 Session 1: The key issues – split into groups

Key questions: (need to add in here the Session 1 prompt questions

once we have firmed up & agreed the objectives)

Might run this as guided focus group or “carousel” type activity

Sub

groups

09:25 20 Plenary & priorities

Feedback on key issues & snapshot of priorities for business

MY

All

09:45 15 Break – refreshments available Jurys

10:00 40 Session 2: The key needs – 2 focus groups

Key questions: (need to add in here the Session 2 prompt questions

once we have firmed up & agreed the objectives)

Sub

groups

10:40 05 What happens next? MY

10:45 20 Sources of help & advice in Hants Env.C.

11:05 05 Thanks & close ?

05 Contingency time

11:15 CLOSE

RESOURCES:

Item 4444 Item 4444 Item 4444 Facilitation toolkit Dig. camera Signs

Flipcharts Notebook computer? Venue details

Paper A4 & A5 LCD projector?

Kitchen roll Extn. lead

Ipod & speaker

118

A2. Sample letter to participants

(IWS headed Paper)

Waste management issues for business

Breakfast meeting at Jurys Inn Southampton

Friday 23 June ‘06 - 08:15 to 11:15 (Breakfast from 08:00)

Many thanks for agreeing to help with this work. We're trying to discover what best

practice in this area is and how best we can help businesses to benefit from effective

waste management. The project is a joint venture with Southampton University and is

funded by The Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

This won't be just another meeting - we are organising it so that the majority of time is set

aside for us to listen to you and build this into the project in very practical ways. We

really do need to hear what you have to say about waste management and how we can

help you by doing things that make business sense.

Please find enclosed a location map of the hotel. Southampton Railway Station is short

walk away and car parking is available on the hotel site.

We look forward to meeting with you on the 23 June, do let me know if you have any

queries and thanks again for your help.

Yours sincerely

Mark Yoxon

Liaison Officer, Environment

enc.

A3. Sample screener script

Waste management issues for business - Recruiting script

Good morning / afternoon

My name is xxx from The Open University Faculty of Technology

and I’m working with Southampton University on a Defra funded project to investigate

business attitudes to waste management. We’re trying to discover what best practice in

this area is and how best we can help businesses to benefit from effective waste

management

I understand from Southampton that you might already have completed a questionnaire

about this project. (this is not a requirement)

119

My reason for telephoning is that we are organising a business breakfast event in central

Southampton to continue our research. We’ve chosen to run a breakfast event so the time

out from the business is minimised – we’ve scheduled 3 hours – from 08:30 to 11:30.

This won’t be just another meeting – we are organising it so that the majority of time is

set aside for us to listen to you and build this into the project in very practical ways. We

really do need to hear what you have to say about waste management and how we can

help you by doing things that make business sense. We’ll also have comprehensive

information packs for all businesses who attend. It’s really important that we use this

Government money to good effect by listening carefully to what businesses say.

So what’s in it for you?

• A chance to make a significant input to this important work

• To pick up ideas and information by talking with others working in this area

• Take away a “waste management makes business sense” pack of practical reference

materials and sources of free help and advice to save you money

• Breakfast

• Oh, and a £25 attendance allowance / donation to a charity of your choice

I would like to invite you or your representative to attend our first meeting on (insert date

& time) at (insert venue).

Can we sign you up?

If no at this point – thanks for your time, there will be other opportunities to take part in

the project. Would it be alright for us to contact you in the autumn? Yes / No?

If yes confirm / change contact details.

Indicate that full joining instructions will be sent out pre event

Thanks for your time and we look forward to meeting with you on (insert date / time /

venue)

120

A Carbon Neutral A Carbon Neutral A Carbon Neutral A Carbon Neutral

EventEventEventEvent

Appendix 6: Results from the first 2 user focus groups.

This is only included in the hard copy and CD version due to the large file size of the

photo-report capturing flip chart input and output.

Southampton C&I Waste Project

23 June 2006

121

PHOTO REPORT

122

123

12 and 13 from EA presentation