EnviroLink Forum

Hi everyone,

I'm an office worker from England, UK. I've recently been given the task to educate colleagues on recycling and stop wastage. I'm hoping you can help me in this journey, although please accept my apologies in advance as I have little knowledge in this subject myself and I'm still learning.

I can't say exactly where I work due to the nature of the job, but all I can say that this is a huge organisation with well over 10's of thousands of staff members working in offices up and down the country. Where I work, we are very limited in what we can do with IT equipment, for example we can't change the computer software/hardware as it's controlled by specialist IT contractors.

Some of the ideas I've come up with so far are:-

CAR POOLING
USING PUBLIC TRANSPORT
REDUCE PAPER WASTAGE BY NOT PRINTING, BUT INSTEAD VIEWING DOCUMENTS ON MONITORS DIRECTLY
SWITCH OFF COMPUTER MONITORS WHEN NOT IN USE

BTW, my tasking in recycling education isn't just about work, but we also need to educate staff how they can change attitude at home too. So in order for me to have a maximum impact, I need to create a poster or magazine article which shows how our electronics end up in 3rd world countries. Any help and ideas would be much appreciated.

Thank you.

No replies? Can anyone help???

Support family planning internationally. If we don't get the population under control nothing else will make any difference. Everything else, like recycling, becomes a feel good distracting placebo.

Thanks for your reply Dingo. I'm still a beginner and I could bring this topic up in the next month or so, but I don't want to be so direct instantly and alienate majority of my colleagues, whom are parents themselves. I'd appreciate it if you could also give me other ideas too.

Thanks

STE, I think this site might give you some good ideas.

http://www.altenergyshift.com/

Hi there, first of all I find it great that you are trying to make changes in your office (you might not have had a say in this, but trying to understand what can be done is the first step!). Your ideas so far are good. I would add (and many of these things will depend on how feasible it is in your office)to create an edible garden, if you have a terrace / balcony – it’s a lot of fun and really gets people to understand how much effort it takes to produce food, and what plants need, and of course so much healthier than supermarket veggies. I think you could also start my informing yourself on what is recycled in your area (as it really depends in the UK, even within the same city), and to pass the information on to your colleagues so the waste really is being recycled properly (even environmentally involved people get this wrong all the time, like taking out the plastic windows of envelopes, rinsing all bottles and jars, etc). You could also, especially if you start an edible garden, start to recycle biomass – it’s pretty quick and the humus it creates is really good for plants, but it can be a bit messy with fruitflies, but which of course are just normal so hopefully shouldn’t be a huge problem. That’s it from me from the top of my head, but I’m sure I’ll think of more soon :)

Also, I really find it annoying when people are super pessimistic and act like everything is already lost. We are still here, and if everyone gave up all the efforts they had been making to save the environment, we'd be even deeper in the sh** for sure, so yeah, don't start your talk to your colleagues by the doom and gloom ;)

How about having a dedicated environment official in every office who's task it it to make sure that everyone follows the rules. Use long lasting lightbulbs, recycled paper, have recycling bins.



I agree, we're not too far gone yet. If people can start making a change then we'll be alright.

Phantom " we're not too far gone yet. If people can start making a change then we'll be alright."
Just keep on believing that, it doesn't matter. "Hopium" is all we have really had this century.

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“Those Who Have the Privilege to Know Have the Duty to Act”…Albert Einstein

Hi
I'm from the UK too, I recently completed a cheap course (£118) called IEMA Environmental Awareness - I'd seriously consider taking the elearning course, I completed it in just over 5hrs (taking my time) and it was really good at making it all tangible also pitched at a level that could be conveyed on to colleagues. A quick search online will bring the course up. Santia was the company I used - more providers may be available. Hope this helps

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