Terberg embraces sustainability

Products that reduce emissions

TMUK moved into new premises in Warrington in April 2021 where it assembles bin lifts which are mounted on both Dennis Eagle bodies and other manufacturers’ RCVs too.

Its Omni range covers bin lifts for both domestic and commercial waste and includes electric bin lifts which can significantly reduce the environmental impact of hydraulic lifts due to the improved energy efficiency of electric motors.

A carefully designed study carried out with Terberg customers found vehicles with electric OmniDEL bin lifts used 9.7% less fuel than similar vehicles with hydraulic OmniDEL lifts covering the same rounds in similar conditions.

This equates to a potential fuel saving of 1400 litres of diesel per vehicle per year or a carbon saving of 3.5 tonnes for RCVs operating on the typical domestic rounds this lift is largely used for. Customers would benefit from the resulting operational cost savings too.

Other ways the Terberg electric bin lifts contribute towards improved sustainability include much quieter operation (<57dB) and significantly reduced running costs.

Operations that reduce waste

Just as TMUK has fully embraced both its customers’ needs and sustainability through its products, the organisation has also led the way within the company in implementing waste management principles to reduce wastage. And they have been remarkably successful.

At Warrington, sustainability has always been the buzz word, and this didn’t change when they moved locations. Fitting out the new offices with furniture made from recycled materials and continuing to embrace and expand upon the environmental possibilities of their new home.

In the workshop, all the lighting is LED to reduce electricity consumption and cut emissions and due to the great natural light, we are able to turn off the lighting completely on bright days. Around the site, every low- occupancy room and office is fitted with P.I.R sensors to switch off lights when nobody is there to need them. We are taking the next step and investigating automating the switching using LUX levels, rather than P.I.R sensors.

Heating was made significantly more efficient by the installation of destratification fans in the roof. These react when the temperature in the roof space reaches a set point and switch on to redistribute the hot air that has accumulated there. The savings are currently being assessed but it is clear the system has led to a significant reduction in energy usage and costs.

TMUK has also installed an on-demand compressor to power tools which is much more energy efficient than the previous equipment. Furthermore, a reduction of the compressors maximum working pressure of just 1 bar has given a 10% energy saving in that piece of equipment.

When tooling is required, we always explore the merits of cordless versions over pneumatic as the running costs to charge batteries is significantly less than charging the compressor for a relatively short application.

Cardboard and single-use plastics have also come under scrutiny with initiatives to reduce both.

The company identified that almost half a tonne of plastic was used in packaging and 3500kg of cardboard waste was collected in 12 months so they invested in a cardboard shredder that would convert waste cardboard into both void fill and wrap.

Aside from being the right thing to do, there will be 25 fewer skip collections, significantly reducing CO² emissions annually along with negating the need for single use plastics, paying back the initial investment within 12 months.

Paper use in the offices was also targeted and each department was challenged with looking at their process’s and identifying potential reductions without compromise. Many documents were digitalised, and on-screen viewing was promoted rather than printing to view. In the two year period up until the end of 2022, collectively TMUK Warrington achieved an astonishing 47% reduction.

All purchases, large or small must have sustainability and energy efficiency as a minimum consideration and is equally as important as cost.

‘Sustainability is about more than just numbers’

Waste Management is so much more than simply providing a means to remove waste from site. Waste streams need to be identified, segregated at source, measured and recycled at every opportunity. But Parts & Quality Manager Mick Bullock, soon realised that he needed to understand what was going on behind those numbers in order to make sense of them and use them to maintain and improve recycling levels.

“You’ve got to look beyond the numbers,” explained Mick.

“Recycling is about people, it relies on them to make the right choices. The numbers help but on their own, they can be misleading and by then sharing negative results, we risk the all-important buy in from our staff.

“For example, with the cardboard shredder in the spare parts department, our recycling rates will plummet as a result of reusing the commodity, so it is vitally important to factor in the gains.

“I recently noticed a sudden decline in our plastic recycling rate and a simple investigation identified that we had a temporary cleaner on board and I had not explained our recycling scheme to him, a simple fix but without tracking our waste management, the issue would have been overlooked.

“We have introduced waste streams for waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) and batteries and actively encourage staff to bring items in from home because we can dispose of them properly. We don’t have to do it, but it helps, and they certainly use it.

“This kind of engagement between the people and the company helps everyone realise we are all in this together and what we’re trying to achieve is fundamental and is really what we’re all about.

“Other initiatives help both ourselves and the local community, which we are a part of. We have a local litter problem so, in National Litter-Picking Week, we joined other businesses in the area for a mass tidy up. Between us, we collected more than a tonne from a relatively short stretch of road.”

Sustainability going forwards

Other aspects of sustainability are in different stages of development at TMUK.

TMUK is currently implementing their environmental management system and aim to achieve ISO14001 accreditation in June 2023. This particular journey has enlightened and educated us as to where further improvements have been achievable.

Since the outbreak of the pandemic, as with the rest of the world, TMUK have conducted many business meetings and training courses using various online mediums and although there will always be a place for face-to-face contact in our industry, virtual meetings will remain the norm. We are developing our own training courses to present online. Along with the savings in time and expense, there is also a measurable carbon reduction for each trainee.

We are also engaging with our major suppliers to supply parts and equipment in re-useable returnable packaging. We already have these initiatives in place but our quest for continual improvement has identified further significant gains.

The introduction of remote access technology into our bin lifts allows us to diagnose defects and change certain parameters remotely rather than dispatching an engineer. Again, measurable carbon savings are captured and monitored in the quest for year-on-year improvements whilst utilising Terberg Connect.

TMUK currently have 15 field-based engineers and although fully electric vans are not yet a feasible option, hybrid versions will be evaluated in the near future.