The British Coatings Federation (BCF) (Coventry, England), a trade association representing the decorative paints, printing inks, powder coatings and wallcoverings industries in the United Kingdom, has released figures that show record improvements in waste, recycling, and accident rates in the previous calendar year.
According to the BCF, 53% of manufacturing companies reported zero landfill waste in 2018, as opposed to 45% of companies the year before. The BCF also claims that production waste in the past year decreased 7.4%, with 9% of all waste sent to landfill.
The trade association also reports a record-high recycling rate of 64%, which is a 2% increase over 2017 and a significant uptick from the 17% rate registered by the BCF when they began keeping such records in 1996.
Finally, the BCF says manufacturing sites have reported a record low of injuries per 100,000 man hours with rates of 0.07 in 2017 and 0.11 in 2018. By contrast, BCF recorded a 0.85 rate in this category in 1996.
“The industry is working continuously to reduce waste, improve recycling and eliminate accidents,” says BCF CEO Tom Bowtell. “I’m proud of the industry’s record improvement levels, which shows our commitment to worker safety and the environment.”
The info for the BCF report was gathered by the group’s Coatings Care Programme, which includes nearly 40 member sites that gather information on a variety of health, safety, and environmental factors.
Companies that show improvements in these areas are presented with awards at BCF’s annual coatings industry awards. Earlier this month, the tenth annual BCF Awards were held in which ten categories were presented, including the BCF Coatings Care Progress Award, which was given to Whitford Worldwide Company (Runcorn, England)—now a subsidiary of PPG (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA)—and the Coatings Care Overall Best Performer Award, which was given to AkzoNobel Packaging (Birmingham, England).
Source: BCF, www.coatings.org.uk.