Waste not, want not

Reducing and recovering construction waste on commercial property refurbishment offers an opportunity to make considerable cost savings, as well as enhancing the project's sustainability credentials. Dr David Moon explains

It is no surprise that demand for refurbishments recently has been well below that of previous years, reflecting many organisations’ reduced cash-flow. According to the Construction Products Association, 56 percent of specialist contractors reported that order books fell in the first quarter of 2009. With such a considerable decline taking place, it is crucial that any possible cost savings are identified and acted upon.

For many commercial refurbishment projects, considering the energy efficiency of the building is a priority – not only to comply with legislation such as the requirement for an Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) upon sale or rental of any commercial building, but also to make crucial long-term savings on operating costs. However, it is less well recognised that financial and environmental benefits can be secured through reducing waste during the refurbishment work.

How to take action
Reducing, reusing and recovering waste in refurbishment projects will help to relieve pressure on diminishing landfill capacity and is a simple way for companies to demonstrate sustainability and materials efficiency. It can also enable organisations to benefit from lower construction costs and these savings should be reflected in more competitive tender prices if a clear requirement is defined at an early stage of procurement. Indeed, a project cost analysis conducted by WRAP has demonstrated that reducing wastage can save up to 1.5 percent of construction value on projects – new build and refurbishment – provided efforts are made to move from standard to good practice.

This Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA), available to download at www.wrap.org.uk/constructioncba includes 15 sample case studies across the housing, commercial, public and refurbishment sectors. In each of these studies, an assessment was conducted into what savings could be achieved by reducing wastage rates from the current industry baseline to a good practice rate. In every application, the forecast savings exceeded the estimated costs of introducing good practice. Moreover, the potential savings that this study identified mean that at a national level, adoption of good practice in only 40 percent of building projects by 2012 could deliver £330m in cash savings. Significant reductions in landfill, carbon emissions and resource use would also be achieved.

The benefits on offer
The opportunities for savings on large-scale refurbishment are indicated by the analysis of a model project, the £3.25m refurbishment of a 9000 sq m office. Using its Net Waste Tool, WRAP calculated that reducing the amount of materials wasted through off-cuts, damage on-site, over- ordering on materials or the need for rework could save this project as much as £12,700. Furthermore, by reducing the quantity of waste generated during the project, the Net Waste Tool calculated that another £4,300 could be saved in waste disposal costs, adding up to an overall cost saving for the project of £17,000. But how can refurbishment clients realise savings such as these?

In order to secure cost savings through good practice waste management, clients must be prepared to invest in specific management actions that will enable a change in behaviour during design and site practice. On this project, actions required to deliver the £17,000 saving were:
- Developing a quality Site Waste Management Plan (SWMP);
- Developing a site logistics strategy;
- Site training;
- Creation of materials storage;
- Management time to ensure good practice behaviour;
- Regular updating of SWMP; and
- Site waste segregation.

The investment required to deliver these actions was £5,800. Subtracting this cost from the estimated £17,000 saving on offer through improved waste management resulted in a total cost saving for this project of £11,200, equal to 0.35 percent of the overall £3.25m project construction cost. In a sector operating on the smallest of margins, this opportunity for savings should not be overlooked.

Further significant savings could be made by looking beyond wastage rates and identifying actions to reduce waste through design changes and re-use of materials. Measuring and reporting on construction, demolition and excavation waste also supports the efficiency agenda, corporate responsibility and sustainable procurement.

Working together
It is essential that the client, main contractor and trade contractors work together on refurbishment projects to ensure that the maximum potential benefit from good waste practices is realised and shared. It is the decisions made in the earliest phases of a construction project that will enable businesses to secure most of the savings. By building the potential for waste reduction into design specifications and wastage allowances for materials purchasing at the tender stage, all will be able to benefit from lower costs. One action that clients can take is to instruct designers to look for waste reduction opportunities, and set threshold waste reduction and recovery targets with the main contractor.

Under the Site Waste Management Plans (SWMP) Regulations – mandatory in England since 2008 for all projects worth over £300,000 – the client and their principal contractor are jointly responsible for compliance, including forecasting quantities of waste and identifying waste management actions. To maximise both cost and environmental benefits, it is essential to start the SWMP at an early design stage, using it to identify opportunities to reduce waste and reuse materials. Therefore the client needs to commission their design team to take action at the outset of a refurbishment project, long before work starts on site. Organisations should look to take action by asking for good practice throughout the tendering process.

WRAP has delivered freely available evidence, guidance and tools for clients and their project teams to make this happen, and the benefits on offer make waste reduction an opportunity that no business can afford to ignore.

Tools and guidance
To help deliver the Government-industry target of halving waste to landfill by 2012, WRAP has developed a number of freely-available tools and offers guidance to support all parts of the construction industry as it works to reduce waste:
- The Net Waste Tool (wrap.org.uk/nwtool) enables project teams to quantify and prioritise the opportunities to reduce and recover waste and use more recovered material, starting at the design stage. User-friendly and project-specific, it can generate a set of metrics and key performance indicators (including cost, waste and carbon savings) which allow organisations to compare performance with sector benchmark data, as well as showing continual improvement as part of an Environmental Management System.
- The Waste to Landfill Reporting Portal, which helps signatories to WRAP’s voluntary agreement – The Construction Commitments: Halving Waste to Landfill – to measure and report annual totals for waste to landfill, comparing their own performance with their peer group as well as demonstrating overall sector progress. For more information on the voluntary agreement, visit: wrap.org.uk/halvingwastetolandfill.
- Guidance on embedding performance requirements for waste reduction, recovery and recycled content into tenders and contracts (wrap.org.uk/procurement_requirements): This is good practice and will allow refurbishment clients to drive change through the procurement process through a range of available resources including project briefs, Employers’ Requirements and contract documents.
- Guidance on designing out waste (wrap.org.uk/designingoutwaste): The SWMP template helps clients and their supply chain produce good and best practice SWMPs (wrap.org.uk/swmp). Providing a six-stage approach to SWMPs, it enables identification of good and best practice opportunities, further driving down waste and identifying potential cost savings.

Dr David Moon is the Programme Manager at WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme). For further details reducing and recovering construction waste, visit: wrap.org.uk/construction