Meet the Team
- Paul Hammond
- Sara Vazquez
- Jill Cowing
- Niuzheng Chai
- Rhianna Williams
- Bex Terry
- Naheed Kanuga
- Michael Crossland
Unsure on where recyclable waste is supposed to go?
Check before you chuck
Sustainable purchasing
We at the Institute of Ophthalmology strive to reduce our overall carbon footprint, however we must also look at the companies we order from and what they are doing to become more sustainable. Purchasing laboratory consumables can produce large carbon footprints from production to delivery, batch deliveries allow for orders to be sent in batches for a more sustainable purchase.
Sustainable travel
Sustainable travel is something that we should all be committed to, the transport sector in the UK accounted for 119.6 million tons of carbon in 2019 and we should all strive to reduce this further in the future. UCL offers a Bike scheme that enables staff to acquire a tax-free bike up the value of £5000, this is a great way to stay active whilst commuting to work with a lower carbon footprint. You can find advice about the bike scheme and everything else bike-related here: Cycle scheme. We at the Institute of Ophthalmology strive to utilise low carbon transport whenever possible, consider your transport needs when going to and from the institute. Walking, cycling or using public transport is always suggested, however, if you have to travel by car consider car sharing.
IoO Sustainable Travel Policy (September 2021)
It is recognised that connectivity is a key part of academic endeavour. However, achieving this connectivity by physically travelling has a significant impact on the climate. 87% of UCL’s travel emissions come from long-distance flights taken by staff. To help to support sustainable travel choices, UCL’s Travel Expenses Policy has been updated to ask you to, and where funding allows, “select the most carbon-efficient way of reaching your destination, even if this may not necessarily be the cheapest”. The climate impact of travel is also an area that funding bodies are starting to reflect on. For example, the Wellcome Trust has recently updated its Travel Policy to address their concerns. They will now cover essential travel costs, even if the low carbon option is more expensive (for example travelling by train instead of flying), and costs for carbon offset.
Points to consider when travelling:
- Reduce the need for travel where possible
- Could the meeting be held using Skype, Teams, Zoom, etc, instead?
- Can you walk, cycle or travel by train rather than by car or air?
- Minimise the impact of road travel using low emission vehicles, and efficient route planning
- If you need to fly, then purchase carbon offset
- Clarity Travel Management offer advice on sustainable travel options
Further details can be found on the Sustainable UCL
Please also refer to the following UCL Finance and Business Affairs website to register your trip.
Sustainable Meetings
Single-use plastic will no longer be used in meetings, paper cups that are used during meetings have a plastic lining on the inside making them only fit for landfill after use. Unfortunately, plastic cutlery isn’t recycled, and contamination of food waste and the time needed to sort and clean causes recycling plants to reject all plastic cutlery as it isn’t seen as cost-effective.
Sustainable catering is suggested for meetings and events, these include vegan and vegetarian options, however, up to 50% can contain meat but some departments of UCL have decided to go 100% vegetarian.
Sustainable printing
We encourage staff and students to use the print@UCL printers rather than having their own personal printer. Printer settings will be defaulted to recycled A4 paper, mono colour and double-sided wherever possible, print jobs not retrieved after 24 hours will be automatically deleted from the print queues to maximise the printer's power-saving whilst not impacting the function of the printer. Please read our printer SOP for further information.
Waste & recycling
Warp It is UCL’s very own recycled item exchange for office furniture, equipment and anything else that is in need of a new home that can find it somewhere else in UCL.
UCL currently recycles around 60% of its waste and aim to increase this number to 85% soon. Laboratory waste uses a lot of single-use plastics and produces large amounts of non-recyclable waste due to contamination. Labs try to recycle as much as possible, whilst ensuring that any materials that enter the domestic waste streams are uncontaminated and safe.
Single-use plastics that are used in laboratories unfortunately cannot be recycled due to chemical and biological contamination, this waste Is sterilised and then sent for incineration with energy recovery. At this current time UCL and the institute are always looking for more sustainable was to dispose of lab-based single use plastics.
Chemicals
Individual groups have chemical lists that can be found with the lab managers to make better use of existing stocks. There is a main prep room on 1st floor where general chemicals are arranged on shelves in alphabetical order but more specialised chemicals are kept in individual's labs. Labs take part in clear outs and unwanted chemicals which are no longer required or needed by other groups are taken to the waste chemical store for collection and disposal. The processs of collecting all data has unfortunately been delayed due to the COVID 19 outbreak but will resume once we are able to return.
Equipment
IoO had an equipment repair workshop organised by Martin Farley in 2019 and it was very successful. We have organised our own one again for 2020 to repair small items of equipment rather than discarding them. The cost of £500 is easily recovered if a couple of items can be made useable again and are good value for money. If we have any equipment that is no longer required by a team, it is first advertised internally to see if another group could make use of it. If it is not needed, then we advertise on WarpIT. Disposal is considered the last option for obsolete equipment of if it is something which cannot be repaired. We have also taken advantage of part-exchange options with items like Real-Time PCR machines. This not only saves us money but the company recycle many of the valuable components such as silver from heating blocks.
Resources and posters
Chameleon poster - Temperature
Cat poster - Green bin
Hamster poster - Orange bin
Pup poster - Black bin
Waste disposal poster
Don't let it drip poster - faucets
Easter switchoff
Christmas switchoff
IoO no fly zone
Find more resources on how to make your offices or labs more sustainable.
Trade Effluent guidance for UCL IoO
Laboratory Waste Poster
