It’s not hard to notice our planet is being choked by the sheer amount of waste that’s produced and not recycled, we’ve been using up the earth’s resources and polluting our planet. Healthcare is often a tricky area for waste management, our clinics need to be clean and often the waste we produce is not recyclable or re-usable.
That’s where APPI is different. Since 2015 we have been looking at our waste and finding solutions on how to be a greener company. The small things often seem insignificant but they can often make the biggest impact, especially when the larger things such as travel can be difficult to tackle. APPI clinics have taken steps to ensure we are reducing our waste, emissions and overall impact on the environment.
1. Reduction in waste sent to landfill
If you think about it, all the plastic you’ve ever used is still around on earth today. To reduce our clinic’s plastic waste, we no longer provide plastic cups at our water fountains; a single-use plastic that’s used for approximately 20 seconds before being thrown in the bin to take about 450 years to degrade! People now bring their own bottles to refill at our filtered water stations to ensure they stay hydrated throughout our classes. We also no longer use bottled water at our events, we infuse water in glass jugs to give to our participants. To help with everyday waste from our clinics, new recycling bins for our staffs’ plastics, tins, paper and food waste have been put in. We’re also using a local company to process all our landfill waste so that all aspects of it are recycled in the correct way, all the things that we can’t recycle due to our council’s restrictions will be processed to ensure we get closer to our zero-waste aim! We also only use the blue roll used to cover the clinic beds just for the pillows to reduce our single use waste. We’ve also asked our laundry company not to wrap our towels in plastic as they come in a material bag anyway! Since we switched to refilling our spray bottles with eco cleaner or making our own we have significantly lowered the amount of plastic spray bottle waste- did you know the spray portion of cleaning bottles cannot be recycled with other plastics? Only companies such as tetra-cycle can process hard to recycle waste. You can find out more about drop off points here! https://bit.ly/2PYqEJg
2. Saving those trees
Recently our marketing has changed, we are trying as best we can to switch from paper print to email or online marketing to cut the number of trees that we use just for someone to read a flyer once. One amazing transition that will save lots of trees, has been our change to paperless notes! Now we are using our wonderful new online TM3 so our paper is cut to a bare minimum. This means our clinics are reducing not only the use of trees, but the water, energy and chemicals used to make it! This also means that the use of plastic pens has dropped significantly, again contributing to lowering our plastic waste.
3. Chemical free studios
To keep our clinics sparkling clean, we use an eco-brand or a natural made cleaner using essential oils and vinegar. The recipe is below if you want to give it a try! We also switched to microfibre cloths instead of throwaway wipes- did you know a lot of these ‘disposable wipes’ contain microplastics? These cloths are perfect as when they need a clean, they just go straight in the laundry. For our Yoga classes we have sustainably sourced, natural cork blocks and natural linen bolsters keeping our studios as zen as possible!
4. Using eco-friendly products and companies
Even our uniforms are eco-friendly- our Asquith clothing is made from a mix of bamboo fibres, which is a sustainable and environmentally low-impact fabric. Bamboo grows faster and absorbs more carbon dioxide than hardwood trees plus the other fibres in the fabric are manufactured from regenerated wood pulp grown with no nasty pesticides or fertilisers! Win, Win. When it comes to staff hot drinks, we use fair trade coffee and tea. By choosing Fairtrade, not only can farmers build a better quality of life for their families and communities, they can invest in growing better quality beans too.
5. Reducing energy usage
To further reduce our laundry, we’ve removed our bed covers so that the surface can just be wiped with our natural cleaner after each client. Very soon we will be using wipe-clean head cushion covers- not only to be more hygienic but also to save the constant washing and drying- using vital energy and water. All saved in a quick wipe with our natural cleaner! During clinic hours we do our best to switch lights off when not using studios, not to have the windows open when the air conditioning is on and to switch off the computers when we leave. All small things that contribute to a bigger picture.
What are you doing at home and at work to make sure you’re committed to lowering your waste and energy usage? We’d love to know!
Equipment cleaner recipe:
In a 500ml spray bottle, add 75ml white cleaning vinegar, 30 drops lavender oil, 30 drops tea tree oil then top up with filtered water!