FEATURE WASTE MANAGEMENT
U ntil recently, Sam MacCuish had been storing sandstone from a previous project for two years in the belief that she’d find some purpose for the ‘waste material’ in the near future. The Managing Director of Lilium Homes in Scotland has since repurposed the sandstone for the facade of a listed building in one project and a “beautiful garden wall” in another. “Effective waste management,” MacCuish explains, “is not only about disposing the stuff we see in the skips or grabs. We also try our hardest to repurpose materials so they don’t become waste in the first instance. “We’ve just finished a beautiful project using repurposed sandstone from another site. We cut it and dressed it to do the facade of a listed building. We used more of it to build a beautiful garden wall. It looks amazing and we still have sandstone left over – roughly 12-15 square metres of it – for another project, so that’s twice we will have used that batch of what could have been waste sandstone.” Sandstone is expensive to transport to and from sites, and its production for construction materials is heavy on the environment. So, MacCuish saved costs, helped the planet and diverted waste from landfill. “Repurposing waste really helps to reduce our carbon footprint,” MacCuish says. “Plus, there was no way we were crushing down that beautiful sandstone to use in someone’s driveway because that’s what tends to happen if it’s taken away.” Covering costs MacCuish is being smart about waste, but she’s optimistic about the shift in the industry more broadly. “It’s definitely getting better,” she says. “Especially in the last two years. Smaller companies are looking for ways to minimise their waste as much as possible. It’s still not as good as it could be because it’s expensive.” Cost, unsurprisingly, is a big issue when it comes to environmentally-minded waste management. So MacCuish builds it into the quotes for clients.
Managing waste in an environmentally- friendly way is more expensive to do but it’s an essential part of being a sustainable business. Sam MacCuish of Lilium Homes shares her approach WASTE NOT WANT NOT
“First of all, we charge for the estimate we send to clients because it’s a lot of work and part of that estimate is really doing a good survey of the site and that’s before we even have an engagement contract with the clients. “We’re trying to give them a really fair and honest estimate and, within that, is waste management. It is the one thing architects and clients forget about with
their projects. They tend to focus on the finished product and forget about what’s coming out of their site, which can sometimes be hundreds of tonnes of waste.” MacCuish explains how managing this part of your business is so important, otherwise “you could be out by tens of thousands of pounds”, adding that for some small companies,
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