Waste is a relatively modern phenomenon. Until quite recently, people used most of what was left from doing one thing, for something else. They couldn’t afford not to. Even the previous generation had recycling in their genes, with my old mum composting peelings, feeding food scraps to her hens and reusing jam jars as, er, jam jars.
Now we know we need to get back to this degree of thrift and beyond. We can’t afford not to. We’ve all heard the dire warning that, if the whole planet lived like we do in the profligate industrialised countries, we’d need three earths to supply the resources, plus a fourth as a rubbish dump.
And it’s not just fear and conscience driving people to waste less. Our leaders are also putting on the pressure. For instance, the EU is demanding that different industries devise ‘roadmaps’ for improving waste performance – and building and its supply chain are under particular scrutiny, with the UK government last year launching a Sustainable Construction Strategy that has waste right at the top of its agenda.
In this new environment, timber potentially has a huge head start. It’s renewable, it can be repaired, recycled in a growing range of ways and finally used as fuel or compost. It could ultimately be a waste-free solution and yet in the UK we still dump 4 million tonnes a year.
Which is why the British Woodworking Federation’s (BWF) Wood Waste Resource Efficiency Project is so vital. This new initiative is focusing on both ways to cut the amount of wood waste generated and use what is produced better. And for critical mass it wants the whole timber sector involved, not just its joinery membership.
The project’s first pilot studies will look at establishing wood waste collection hubs, improving yield through more precise procurement and wood energy use in schools.
The BWF’s eventual aim is cross-industry waste strategies to make wood the ultimate cradle to grave green material; starting out in sustainably managed forests and ending up reinvented as another product or an eco- friendly energy source. That would add up to some sales slogan.
