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Grounds Maintenance, Landscape Creation, Arboriculture, Sports Surfacing, Parks management, IOS Managing Safely Training, Ecology & Biodiversity, Grass cutting, Horticulture, Street Cleaning, Soft Landscaping, Hard Landscaping
Our Services
idverde provides a wide range of green services, including grounds maintenance, landscape creation, and advice services, to both private and public sectors across the UK.
Recycle, Reuse and Recover
Our arboriculture teams, who are responsible for tree maintenance for a range of private and public sectors, wanted to set their own objectives of finding new ways to recycle timber by-products in order to minimise waste to landfills.
As part of our Sustainability Strategy, we are always implementing new ways to take care of the environment. One of our sustainability commitments is to improve how we manage waste and resources by recovering 100% of our green waste and recovering 80% of all other waste. In order to achieve this target, we will draw upon some of our best local practices and apply them to the wider business.
Our arboriculture teams, who are responsible for tree maintenance for a range of private and public sectors, wanted to set their own objectives of finding new ways to recycle timber by-products in order to minimise waste to landfills.
In 2020, the UK generated around 4.5 million tonnes of waste wood. This wood comes from a number of different sectors, including construction, demolition, manufacturing and wood processing. Around half a million tonnes of wood is landfilled every year, which contributes to a major source of pollution as landfills produce gases such as methane and CO2.
The right infrastructure, permissions, machinery and equipment are required to be able to handle, process, stockpile and dispose of various forms of timber.
The idverde Wimborne Depot has all of the above in place including an exemption certificate from the Environment Agency which permits us to use large bays for stockpiling various grades and forms of materials. This allows our team to segregate by softwood, hardwood, woodchip, timber lengths and timber in the round.
Segregating and storing material in the right way ensures our timber by-products can be processed effectively and retain the qualities required for the next stage of use – whatever that may be. We apply the waste hierarchy wherever possible to minimise waste to landfills and to maximise the opportunity to reuse these materials for different purposes.
How we recycle and reuse
One of the most effective ways we reuse by-products is by using bark chippings for our local landscaping and maintenance projects. In order to do this properly, we operate a mechanical sieve at our depot. This allows us to grade our material to whatever standard is ultimately required. The end product is then used for mulching shrub beds and maintaining woodchip footpaths on some of the contracts we deliver locally.
Additionally, we have formed many partnerships and relationships over the years to make other use out of these materials. One example includes local business New Forest Sawmill, which takes lengths of softwood and hardwood timber species. New Forest Sawmill is a live edge wood supplier that understands the importance of ethically sourced materials and shares our passion for reducing waste. Another more unusual example is the use of a large diameter cedar which was taken by a partner for creating coffin veneer.
Converting to energy
Even after trying to find uses for our material locally, there is often more that can be reused. Therefore, we move along the waste hierarchy to alternative measures such as the recovery of the resource for energy.
The idverde depot infrastructure allows for the logistical access of articulated lorries. These lorries will periodically visit the site to remove large quantities of timber by-products. Through building relationships with local recycling companies such as Sylvagen, we are able to make further use out of materials. This year, we have already transferred seven lorry loads of by-product material to Sylvagen. This included 81 tonnes of woodchip and 108 tonnes of timber which were used as biomass fuel for energy and heat production. Some material collected by Sylvagen is processed and then passed on as feedstock for the panel board industry, creating a new product altogether.
Arboriculture services
Our Wimborne depot has been undertaking arboriculture works in excess of 40 years, working with a range of public and private sectors to provide services. Our team remains biodiversity and environmentally conscious throughout everything we do. Find out more about the services we offer here.