Plastic Free July and Waste Reduction

This month is Plastic Free July, a global movement encouraging millions of people and organisations to be the solution to a planet free of plastic pollution. It is now more essential than ever to limit our consumption of plastic given our Earth is currently covered by a horrific 5 billion tons of plastic waste. Not only does this affect our ecosystems and the health of the environment around us but it also has a direct impact on our own health.

At Bouygues UK, we want to be part of a world free of plastic waste.

At Bouygues UK, we want to be part of a world free of plastic waste, in fact all avoidable waste, which is why we embed approaches to help us work towards this future into our everyday actions on our construction sites.

Plastic Free July serves as reminder about the issue of waste more generally and the effects this has on our climate and the environment. For us, every project is an opportunity to build a brighter, greener, cleaner future and so, we have set out targets within our Climate & Environment Strategy to reduce our corporate waste year on year, with the goal of 40% reduction by 2030. By carrying out awareness workshops and reduction plans from design stage right through to completion, we are confident that this meaningful engagement throughout the entire value chain will allow us to ensure that our waste production is kept to a minimum.

When waste cannot be avoided, Bouygues UK has alternative solutions to make sure that it can be repurposed where possible. For example, we have partnered with Protec and have mandated that all our projects utilise Protec’s ClosedLoop Remanufacturing Scheme to divert their used Proplex from mixed waste streams. Protec have a state-of-the-art wash plant and recycling line specifically developed for our application, which allows us to bring back used material and recycle it into new protection sheets, the world’s first Closed Loop solution for these types of material.

In 2022, through our partnership with Protec, we successfully returned 6360kg of Proplex through the closed loop system, saving 22 tCO2e.

A certificate of recycling was awarded by Protec to our team working on the Ray Dolby Centre, our project for the University of Cambridge. Over the course of the project, they have successfully been able to return a total of 7160kg of Proplex, resulting in 25 tCO2e saved.

We are proud to be supporting Plastic Free July this year through a month-long internal awareness campaign focusing on ways that our staff can reduce waste not only within the construction industry, but within their personal lives and raising awareness of best practices that can be followed. This forms an integral part of our journey to reaching our wider climate and environment goals for 2025 and beyond.

By continuing to work closely with our clients, supply chain partners and employees we know can help reduce the environmental impact of our activities and ensure a more waste free reality for the construction industry.