Liv­er­pool Micro­bi­ol­o­gy lab­o­ra­to­ry was receiv­ing large num­bers of test kits each week for the Roche LIAT assay. Deliv­er­ies were up to 35 large card­board car­tons, each con­sist­ing of three box­es of LIAT test kits and up to six large plas­tic ice bricks, lined with poly­styrene insulation.

The large amount of plas­tic use and week­ly waste pre­sent­ed the team with a chal­lenge. Dis­cus­sions com­menced with the sup­pli­er and after much col­lab­o­ra­tion it was deter­mined that dis­tri­b­u­tion prac­tices could be changed.

The results of this project have seen an improve­ment across mul­ti­ple key areas of envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty and stream­lined work prac­tices. This includes sig­nif­i­cant reduc­tion in trans­port costs and logis­tics to the dis­tri­b­u­tion com­pa­ny; reduc­tion in time and staff resources required to unpack kits once deliv­ered; com­plete reduc­tion in the amount of sin­gle use items such as poly­styrene pack­ag­ing and ice bricks going to waste; and no addi­tion­al rub­bish removal from laboratory.

These sig­nif­i­cant results demon­strate how col­lab­o­ra­tion with exter­nal part­ners can have a big impact on our inter­nal envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty practices.