• Batch Cooking is a great way to save time and money whilst reducing your environmental impact. It reduces the amount of food waste you produce and is a great way of eating healthier and controlling portion sizes. It is also a great way to use all those Chinese takeaway dishes you don’t know what to do with!

  • Ditch the single use plastic – almost all of the plastic ever made still exists in one form or another. One reusable water bottle can save 52 plastic water bottles per person annually

  • Buying locally grown, seasonal produce greatly reduces your foods carbon footprint and is also a great way to support local farmers and industry

  • Walking or cycling produces zero carbon and has huge benefits to your physical and mental health. A car would need to reach over 200 miles per gallon efficiency to come close to walking

  • Simple changes like turning your washing machine to 30 instead of 40, reducing the thermostat by one degree and taking four minute showers instead of baths can reduce your carbon emission and save up to £250 a year

  • Single occupant cars produce two times more emissions than a bus per person. By taking the bus, you save money on parking and buses can often take you closer to where you want to be than if you went by car

  • Washing in the tumble drier can cost as much as 67p, this equates to up to £70 based on 2 loads per week. If possible, dry your clothes on the line to save money

  • Underinflated tyres can cost an additional 545 litres of fuel per year for a person doing the average mileage a year (12,000 miles). This is equivalent to 1.3 extra tonnes of greenhouse gases. Most vehicles display the recommended pressures inside the door frame or inside the glove box

  • Professional draught proofing can cost up to £225 but will save you around £125 per year. DIY draught proofing is much cheaper and is easy to do.

The smallest actions can make a difference

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Let’s celebrate Earth Day, 22 April, by doing our bit for the Earth. This year’s themes include volunteering, find out what you can do for your local and global environment on Earth Day's website. Read more in our Green Plan, or sign up to our Green Champions by emailing sustainability@merseycare.nhs.net.

International Plastic Bag Free Day, 3 July

3 July 2023 is International Plastic Bag Free Day. Plastic bags may seem like a grocery shopping convenience, but they are also a huge strain on the environment. It can take up to 500 years for plastic bags to disintegrate, so they make up a large portion of what stays in our landfills and pollutes our waterways.

Recycling week

This recycling week, check out our dedicated recycling page on YourSpace to see what we recycle at the Trust. Why not join our green champions network to share your ideas and concerns around sustainability at the Trust.

Children’s Sustainability and Nutrition Materials

Sustainability is a big concept for children to understand. But it’s important to teach them what it means and how to contribute to helping the environment and the planet. Start by modelling the basics, such as minimizing your rubbish (the first “R” in the “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” sustainability mantra!) and planting and watering your own vegetables. See the attached document for what you will need.

To show the ways which we can reuse items and teach children about eating a varied diet, try this activity to grow your own veg with used glass jars and household items:

1.         Find a glass jar or plastic tub from your recycling and buy some cress seeds from a local garden centre.

2.         Line the bottom of your jar or tub with paper towels or cotton wool.

3.         Sprinkle your cress seeds over damp tissue or cotton wool.

4.         Cover with cling film or a tea towel and keep the cotton or towels moist by sprinkling water on twice a day.

5.         Cress seeds can germinate within 24 hours.

6.         Within five to seven days your cress will be ready to snip into sandwiches.

 

One different way to recycle our waste is through composting! Composting isn’t just environmentally friendly; it’s also a cool science project. Keep the bin outside and follow this quick how-to:

1.         Line the bottom of the bin with twigs, top them with leaves, and add some water.

2.         Add food scraps such as carrots, potato peels, apple cores, coffee grounds, eggshells, and bread crust on top of the leaves, and again, add some water.

3.         Alternate leaves and food scraps a few times.

4.         Once the bin is full, mix everything around each week.

5.         Observe how everything changes and starts to break down.

6.         After three to 12 months, use your compost in the garden or potted plant.

 

Introducing sustainability through helping with chores:

Washing clothes. Showing them how to load and unload the washing machine is one thing, but as they grow up and start to learn numbers and words, why not try getting them to turn the washing machine on 30°C?

Use it as a chance to explain about sustainable fuels and saving energy.

Pack groceries into reusable bags. This is an easy change to make, and you can get some cotton carrier bags to replace the plastic ones! Get your children to help with the shopping, explaining how plastic bags ending up in landfills and oceans is causing harm to the planet.

Ask them to help with the recycling. From taking empty cereal cardboard to the recycling bin to donating old clothes to charity, there are plenty of ways they can help. You can also teach them to put banana skins, eggshells, apple cores and more in a food waste bin instead of the rubbish bin.

See the below image for planet friendly habits to teach children.

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Gift wrapping

In the UK, we use 227,000km of wrapping paper each Christmas, this is enough to circle the earth 5.6 times! Most of this wrapping paper is not recyclable as it is made of plastic, foil or glitter.

Here are some tips to be more sustainable:

  • Use string rather than sticky tape to wrap gifts
  • Gift bags can be re-used time and time again
  • Reduce, reuse, recycle! Reuse old magazines, comics, newspaper or fabric to wrap gifts to add some personal flair.
  • Remove sticky tape before recycling wrapping paper so that Merseyside Recycling will be able to process it (What Can Be Recycled? - Merseyside Recycling and Waste Authority)

Food

About five million puddings, two million turkeys, and 74 million mince pies go to waste each Christmas. Help reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect our natural resources by thinking carefully about how much food you buy this festive season.

  • Choose seasonal and local grown vegetables 
  • Choose free range meats, where affordable
  • Select a cut of meat suitable for the size of your family 
  • Consider going vegetarian or vegan, there are many suitable options that are just as tasty as the traditional turkey
  • Use the correct bin for the waste, food waste can recycled into bio-gas and fertiliser
  • Select a cut of meat suitable for the size of your family. 

Christmas tree

If you’re looking for a sustainable Christmas tree that’s been grown using fewer pesticides, your best bet is a Forest Stewardship Council (FSC®) certified, or a Grown In Britain tree. According to the Carbon Trust, a two-metre artificial tree has a carbon footprint of around 40kg, more than ten times that of a real tree that’s burned after Christmas.

  • Check to see if your local council recycle it, if you can pop it in your garden waste recycling bin. Alternatively if you, or someone you know has a wood burner (and the storage space) the branches give off a lovely smell and crackle and pop if you put them in with your other logs. Some garden centres offer a “return and recycle” where you can exchange your tree for a money off voucher or a small refund
  • Fly tipping of Christmas trees is an offence and you can even be prosecuted and issued with a fine in excess of £400 and additional fees for removal and disposal
  • It would cost the UK taxpayer £22million to dispose of inappropriately discarded Christmas trees. Use your local council tip for the disposal and the material will then be recycled into compost or fuel to produce energy and reduces the carbon impact by up to 80%
  • Sponsor a tree at the NHS Forest this winter as a gift and receive a Christmas card to print and send to a loved one Sponsor a tree.

Energy

In the UK, we spend around £1 million on Christmas day just powering our TVs. In fact, we watch so much TV on Christmas day, the energy used could power 43,000 TVs for one year!

  • When cooking your Christmas dinner, turn your heating down or off, plenty of heat will already be circulated around the house!
  • Switch off appliances when you're not using them, or visiting friends and family. Having items on standby still uses electricity. This will help save energy, money and reduce your household carbon emissions.
  • Set your Christmas lights on a timer to avoid unnecessary waste and keep costs down. Alternatively, turning your festive lights off one hour earlier each day over the Christmas period is enough to reduce their energy consumption by 20%
  • Replace dated Christmas lights with modern LED Christmas lights. LED Christmas lights use 90% less energy than their traditional incandescent predecessor. They're also significantly safer, more durable and don't require the annoying bulb push/twist to find the broken bulb.

As we approach winter, it's time to start heating our homes more.

There is always the temptation to set the thermostat to a constant temperature continuously from start to finish, but this is only beneficial if you are at home all day. If you will be away for a significant portion of your day, set your thermostat as normal on an on/off basis. A Smart thermostat can improve your energy savings further, opting for a smart thermostat with a geo-fence functionality will automatically switch your heating off when you leave your house, it can also learn your daily schedule and slowly increase the temperature in the 15 minutes before you would normally arrive home.

  • Get your boiler serviced. Not only will this keep your boiler working in tip-top condition, it also reduces the risk of breakdown. Winter is cold enough, without a day where the heating doesn't work
  • Draught proofing a relatively cheap and easy solution to help keep your home more draught proof. Draught proofing can be readily purchased from a local DIY store and can easily be applied around door and window frames.
  • Ventilate your home to avoid damp. This can be achieved by opening your windows for as little as 10 minutes per day without lowering the temperature too much. This will provide enough fresh air in your home to reduce the chance of damp and mould in your home. 
  • Find a temperature that provides comfort. Did you know that when the temperature outside is very cold and the temperature inside your house is very high, the house cools down quicker in homes that aren't well insulated? If you can manage comfortably with your home at 19 degrees instead of 21 degrees, the home will stay warmer for a bit longer when the heating goes off. This will mean it will require less energy to warm back up again when the heating goes back on and will reduce your energy bills
  • Dress well rather than using the heating. When the temperature is only 1 degree lower than you are used to and your heating isn't due to come on for the next hour, it's worth putting on a jumper or using one of those decorative blankets to see you through the final hour. 
  • Use reflectors behind radiators on external walls. This will enable more of the heat produced by the radiator to be circulated into the room rather than heating the wall. Warm walls will also draw more moisture up the wall and cause a rising damp issue to worsen. Radiator reflector foil is another cheap and easy solution to improve the heat in your home. There are also radiator fans that are available now, these will draw the heat up the back of the radiator and blow the warm air towards the centre of the room. With advances in motor/fan technology, these fans are relatively inexpensive to run. 
  • Insulate your outdoor pipes and taps. Uninsulated pipes can freeze in as little as 6 hours overnight when the temperatures drop below 0 degrees. This can cause the pipes to rupture. On average, each burst pipe episode costs around £7,000 worth of damage based on insurance claims records. Use the frost protection mode on your boiler if you are away for extended periods over the Christmas period
  • Cavity wall insulation. Nearly 35% of a home’s heat is lost through the walls. This can be reduced to 15% if cavity wall insulation is added. This can be achieved by injecting polystyrene beads into the cavity and is done by a professional
  • Loft insulation. The thicker your loft insulation the better, however, if you use your loft as a storage space, having items sitting directly on the insulation compresses it and drastically reduces its effectiveness. Loft insulation relies on creating layers or pockets of air to reduce the amount of heat being conducted into the open and often cold space in your loft. Don't forget to insulate your loft door as well as this is often a cold spot. Aim to have your loft insulation at a minimum thickness of 270mm. If you are adding additional insulation, this should be applied perpendicular to the direction of any existing insulation to seal up any gaps between the existing sheets. Up to 25% of a home’s heat is lost through uninsulated lofts
  • Open your oven when you have finished cooking to allow the remaining heat to escape into the house and increase its temperature. If you leave it closed, the heat dissipates slowly and is wasted
  • Insulate your windows. If you cannot replace/upgrade your windows for whatever reason, there are still options. There are thermal films available that can be applied to frames, this creates an additional pocket of air that reduces the amount heat that is lost through the panes. This involves a sticky backed film that can be applied and tightened using a hair dryer. Additionally, a pair of heavy curtains can be used during winter to reduce heat loss
  • Funding is available from local councils and central government to assist those that require help with energy improvements

  1. Find energy grants for your home (Help to Heat) - GOV.UK - Government grants 

  2. Apply for help via the Energy Company Obligations (ECO4) scheme - Liverpool City Council - Liverpool Council

  3. Heating and hot water - Sefton Council 

  4. Energy efficiency improvement schemes - St Helens Borough Council - St Helens Council

  5. Energy efficient homes | warrington.gov.uk - Warrington Council 

  6. Upgrade your home for free - Wigan Council 

  7. Heating and Renovation financial assistance | wirral.gov.uk - Wirral Council

  8. Energy advice and help | Knowsley Council - Knowsley Council

  9. Green Homes Grant - Halton Council

NHSE held a Greener NHS event showcasing the progress made across the North West on Greener NHS initiatives - and highlighting that equality and Greener NHS go hand in hand.

If you weren’t able to attend the event but would like to see what was discussed, you can watch a recording of the event on YouTube.