Dr Adam Read MBE, Chief Sustainability & External Affairs Officer at SUEZ, shares his thoughts on whether the term ‘waste’ is putting off young people from the sector, how the sector should react if net zero policies are scrapped, and why a more compelling narrative is needed to attract the next generation of talent to green industries.

Throughout June, Circular Online is exploring how to make the resources and waste sector more attractive to the next generation of talent.

In a wide-ranging and insightful conversation, Dr Adam Read MBE discussed his thoughts on the challenges to achieving this goal and what changes could have the biggest impact.

Often people in the sector say they fell into their roles and ended up loving them. What steps can be taken to ensure resources and waste is a sector of choice for young professionals?

This rings true, and that’s because the sector and the opportunities it offers were not featured in schools or universities, neither in class nor as field trips nor with careers advisors. This has begun to change, but not quickly enough.

Firstly, we need to showcase the broad range of great careers available in the sector, profiling the transferable nature of the skills you can develop, which will make you attractive in many other walks of life. Looking ahead, we must identify the roles we will need in 3, 5 or 10 years and the associated skills.

Importantly, we must demonstrate that our sector is not ‘dirty’ or simply end of pipe, rather it offers good pay, with great training and development opportunities, and can be both technically and emotionally fulfilling as part of the transition to sustainable lifestyles and one planet living.

But we need the support of the government and the curricula, of school and university careers advisors and the major employers to make this happen!

Is terminology like ‘waste’ putting young people off pursuing a career in the sector? How does language need to change to improve sector attractiveness? 

Totally! The incoming CIWM President Vicki Hughes is spot on when she talks about the negative impression that the word will conjure up for many young people; it certainly doesn’t shout meaningful employment, quality careers or personal satisfaction.

If it were as simple as replacing waste with resources, we might have done this a decade ago, but the term is less familiar to many. We need to ask real people – those looking at their careers, their education choices and their development – what they would react positively to, what would attract them to our sector, a sector in rapid transition, with so much potential and opportunity.

Is it about the circular economy? Our research suggests that’s unlikely. Is it about recycling, for some yes, but it is so much more than a phrase or word, it is a changing of the narrative about the sector that is most needed, outlining its role in creating a vibrant and resilient, resource efficient economy, one that supports decarbonisation, protects nature and creates shared value for local communities.

The incoming CIWM President’s campaign will help drive a new momentum around this in the coming year!

Is the link between sustainability, climate change, and net zero, and the sector widely understood? If this was clearer, do you think this would attract more talent to the sector?

Currently, I would have to say no, it isn’t. As a professional geographer, former university lecturer in environmental policy and management, and a STEM Ambassador, I can see these links and have been looking at them since the early 1990s.

So much of the work our sector has been delivering since then has been about environmental protection, reducing carbon impacts, managing harmful pollutants and protecting communities.

The evidence is there, the data is compelling, but we are failing to join these dots when it comes to the curriculum at secondary level and above, and to a lesser degree in our research and development programmes.

We need to demonstrate to the public at large the need to go beyond recycling, that the sector is working hard to drive resource efficiency, reducing the demand on our precious natural resources, and the need to rethink our throw-away society.

Maintaining the momentum built since Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet and using it to reposition our sector and the work it does in the public eye is critical.

You’ve previously written about the need to create a better narrative about the career opportunities of working in green industries. What should this narrative be?

I think this is clear, and I have been banging the drum since my Presidential Report was published in June 2021.

We need the next generation and the people guiding them – parents, school-leavers, graduates and careers advisors to put any preconceived ideas they might have about our sector to one side – landfill is increasingly a thing of the past, and a whole unseen world sits behind the collection services people experience day to day.

The sector has moved on and continues to advance at an unprecedented rate,  bringing huge opportunities for those embarking on a career in the industry.

We need a mix of new skills, new capabilities, and new application, but we also need people with passion, people who can work alone and as part of a team, and results-driven people who can disrupt and make change happen.

As we grow our recycling capabilities, expand our recovery operations, and mainstream repair, refurb and reuse we will see a new generation of material specialists, handlers, and reprocessors blossom.

And we will also need advanced biologists, chemists and engineers to build the facilities of tomorrow, data scientists to drive innovation and efficiency, and entrepreneurs to drive new circular business models.

How exciting is all that? But to make the kind of progress that I was predicting back in 2021, we need to tell our story in a way that reaches and resonates with the next generation.

What skills does the sector need to attract in the short, medium and long term?

Right now, we need the drivers and front-line crews essential to the successful implementation of Simpler Recycling.

Looking ahead, we will need more staff at our HWRCs to intercept materials for recycling, repair and reuse, and engineers to build the technologies being rolled out to manage our materials, including AD, advanced MRFs and specialist battery recycling.

In the medium term, the focus will be on segregating, handling and upcycling materials, with a boom in repair and refurb for both electricals and furniture. There will also be a need for more technology innovation, from AI sorting to reverse logistics, just-in-time collections and of course, carbon capture.

In the longer term, the focus will be on circular business models, rental, leasing, and takeback – providing more bespoke services, whilst targeting niche material streams for reprocessing and working more closely with designers so that products and packaging are better aligned to the services we offer.

And of course, we have the unknowns – POPs, PFAs, vapes are just some of the materials we weren’t planning on managing just a decade ago. The sector deals with stress well and adaptability and responsiveness will be key attributes of the workforce in 2040.

CIWM called the withdrawal of funding for 16 apprenticeship standards by the UK Government a ‘missed opportunity’. What was your reaction to the plans?

I too was disappointed, given some of these roles are a natural entry point to the world of waste management and provide a valuable early career path.

However, I have been asking for a fresh approach to the Apprenticeship Levy for many years, so I welcome the government’s plans to utilise the budget to get young people into work.

But I fear the government completely missed the opportunity to support the green skills agenda, focusing on energy primarily, which, at the time, I said was short-sighted.

I continue to work with CIWM and Government to get the balance right, and Skills England is a key body for ensuring our sector, the skills needed, and the funding support are better aligned going forward.

How can government better support recruitment in green industries? Is it realistic to expect this policy support, especially with the polls indicating an explicitly anti-net-zero Reform-government winning the next election?

Government needs to complete the invaluable work undertaken by the Green Jobs Delivery Group that stalled when the last election was announced.

The cross-sector body had not only mapped out the skills and competencies needed to deliver net zero in more than a dozen sectors, but it had also assessed the transferable skills and the timing of any significant upskilling and employment, providing a clear picture of what roles would be needed when and where.

Unfortunately, this sits on a shelf in DEFRA, and whilst DESNZ have ploughed on with aspects of this work for the energy sector, the wider work and insight remain in limbo, growing more dated by the week!

The government needs to look at the skills work in both Scotland and Wales to see what is possible in terms of creating a credible view of future need, which provides trade bodies, employers and training institutes with clarity on the future demand for these skills and roles.

Alongside this, government must create policy certainty and stability as this will enable the likes of SUEZ to plan accordingly – new contracts, new sites, new technologies, new services, new people and new skills.

If Reform is successful, then as a sector we will have to pivot and demonstrate that the green skills needed are critical skills that will underpin local and regional economic growth.

Some of this narrative became evident in the last year of the Conservative administration and is seen in the Labour Government’s drive for growth – our sector is all about jobs, economic benefits and community wellbeing. 

In the context of energy price rises, global resource risks and the opportunities for onshoring materials and jobs, this is a compelling narrative for any party’s manifesto.

What actions can the sector take to attract talent if there is no government appetite to provide support? 

We’re not seeking financial support; we need policy certainty and a willingness to help make the sector more visible and more accessible for schools and colleges. In that scenario, the sector can do much of the heavy lifting.

If we know the goal posts won’t be changing any time soon, we can commit to recruitment programmes, training and development projects, apprenticeships, internships and mentoring programmes to build the workforce of tomorrow.

But if potential employees aren’t looking at our sector, then these programmes are inherently destined to underperform, which is why government can help through policy clarity and curriculum visibility – we stand ready to do the rest! 

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The UK’s green economy is worth £105bn and generating ‘high-wage jobs’ across every UK nation and region, research from the Confederation of British Industry finds.

Despite being often framed as a cost or a constraint on the economy, the research found that net zero generates around £105bn in Gross Value Added (GVA) and supports 1.1m full-time equivalent jobs.

GVA is a way of measuring how much value a business, industry, or region contributes to the country’s economy.

According to the analysis, for every £1 of economic value created directly by net zero firms, a further £1.85 is generated across the wider UK economy through supply chains and household spending.

Established in 1965, the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) is the UK’s largest British business interest group.

The analysis, produced by CBI Economics, found the net zero sector supports jobs in energy, manufacturing, construction, engineering, and professional services.

The sector is underpinned by more than 23,500 businesses, according to the research, over 96% of which are small or medium-sized enterprises.

The CBI said that net zero is one of the UK’s ‘most productive and geographically distributed industrial sectors’.

Louise Hellem, Chief Economist at CBI, said net zero is a ‘significant and growing’ part of the UK’s industrial base. 

“What stands out is not just the scale, but the breadth. Net zero-related activity is embedded across energy, manufacturing, construction, engineering and professional services, with activity present in every nation and region of the UK,” Hellem said.

However, she warned the opportunity is not guaranteed.

“The ability to convert investment pipelines into delivered projects, develop the necessary skills, and create a stable environment for business investment will be critical to determining how much value the UK ultimately captures,” she continued.

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Sophie Thomas OBE, Founding Partner at etsaW Ventures, gives an inside look at an innovative pilot programme aiming to connect the design and waste management sectors and increase circularity.

On a crisp day in March, a group of designers sit around a table in the Brighton Waste House staring at a pile of broken and unwanted electronics. This was the first outing for the Design Skills for Embedding Circularity programme design cohort.

This pilot programme, backed by CIWM, CEI, Design Council, WRAP and Urge Collective, is a direct response to the call set out by Tim Walker in his presidential report back in 2024 when he asked: ‘Is waste a failure of design?’.

The report recommended:

• increased communication and learning between the Design and Waste Management sectors;
• identifying key sector responsibilities, including the upskilling of designers to increase knowledge and credibility;
• the creation and sharing of third-party verified resources;
• the creation of feedback loops through the waste management sector into brands/manufacturers/designers on key problematic items;
• and the highlighting of the economic impact of waste disposal on the public sector.

So, we have embarked on an investigative pilot to explore effective ways to foster good communication between the sectors. A cohort of 15 practising industrial designers was selected from applicants who responded to our call for UK participants.

Using the focus areas set out by the Circular Economy Task Force, it focused on hot topics like Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and reuse and mixed waste streams, and the final cohort selected worked in furniture, electronics, mobility, and packaging.

The programme has been developed by Alexie Sommer from Urge Collective and myself to run through two main phases and an output presentation, building on design residency methodologies from The Great Recovery programme that ran between 2012-2016 and Urge’s facilitation expertise.

The first is immersion (what we call ‘seeing is believing’), with three months of facility visits and expert webinars. The second is response, a 6-week design sprint that allows for deeper research dives into some of the challenges observed, encouraging collaboration across the sectors.

Insights from both phases will be fed back into the industries and government, discussing the outcomes, showing case studies, and demonstrating best practice for moving forward and scaling up.

Doing electronic teardowns with CIWM President David Greenfield and his team from Tech TakeBack was just the beginning. Since then, the team have travelled across the UK visiting major waste recovery facilities, speciality recyclers, paper mills, and manufacturing businesses.

Among the facilities that opened up their doors and gave us access to their teams were DS Smith, Sherbourne Recycling, Decathlon, Biffa, Enfinium, and SUEZ.

But what difference does it really make to watch a trommel toss out paper from glass, or see a robot pick the flexible plastics off a belt? Does experiencing the impact of an MRF fire started by a vape device, or getting the low down on which plastic type is not economically worth sorting, change the way we design our products?

My answer is that it should do. As an industry, we forget that most people don’t see how waste is handled and know how value is recovered from bags of recycling.

Designers are also not taught seriously about end-of-life and are not encouraged to consider it when designing. They are often told that they hold no influence, and when they do want to know more, they don’t know where to source good data.

There is a huge reliance on information put out by material suppliers when specifying for new products and packaging, which could be described as so generic it’s closer to greenwashing.

Many of the products that the programme cohort design would (or should) not end up in a household’s municipal recycling. So where do they go? It was only quite far into the programme when we realised we had not yet seen the answer to this question.

Small electrical products would hopefully end up in a WEEE bin, located in specific shops, streets or HWRCs. That is if you can find one. The WEEE bin locator was often found to be incorrect or out of date, sending people on wild goose chases to find them.

What about the products that don’t include electronics? Household products (cookware, cups and plates, toys, furniture, etc) are less visible in our end-of-life system. If they are lucky, they would end up getting re-routed back into the system whilst going through a reuse hub like the one run by Suez in Manchester.

If they didn’t have vintage or resale value, they would end up at the HWRCs in the unrecyclable or black bin skips, or confusion may see them thrown into a recycling bin. It was a shock to the group to find out that a big chunk of the things they design may well end up in the incineration pile.

The resource and waste industry is in continual reaction mode to legislation shifts, economic market impacts, and the continual influx of new products, where they have no direct input or opportunity to help reduce end-of-life impact.

Packaging and products are evolving all the time and will often have big R&D budgets with briefs that emphasise better ergonomics, more efficient material usage, and customer satisfaction. Why is the waste management sector not included in this process?

The programme has been interspersed with expert conversations, covering topical subjects of simpler recycling, standards and regulations, technology advances and limitations, fluidity and economics of secondary material markets, and design potential in recycling and circularity.

This level of access for designers has arguably not happened since The Great Recovery, but we can see that it is still very much needed if we do want to shift towards more circularity in our systems.

We spent days deep in household waste streams at several different MRFs across the country, understanding the UK nuances in our infrastructure and collection systems.

Seeing it in action with your own eyes and hearing from those on the ground is completely different to reading about the process. It’s not only eye-opening, but there is a huge amount of myth-busting happening along the way.

Many more designers are now considering substituting plastics for ‘recyclable’ materials or bio-alternatives, but the arguments for or against are still very fluid. If designers do consider using ‘recyclable’ materials in their design, they believe it will be recycled, but our visits showed that this is not always the case.

A biodegradable material on a product will not go through anaerobic digestion (AD) if there is no provision for it to do so (we also may not have the correct conditions in the UK for it to break down). It’s very probable that wherever the product gets thrown away, it will eventually go to incineration.

The programme is now moving into the next phase, and the designers are ready to start tackling the big challenges they observed through the design sprint. Their site visit observations, information gathered, and connections made will inform the enquiries the designers will tackle during the sprint.

In parallel, partners Biffa and Decathlon have set sprint challenges. These range from:

• designing approaches that prevent vapes from entering household waste and recycling streams;
• demonstrator concepts that enable easier disassembly and recovery of high-value components from small electronics, especially lithium batteries;
• how to design out festival tent waste;
• and how to design a practical and scalable reusable packaging system for buy-back/resale programmes.

Interest in the Design Skills for Embedding Circularity programme has come from across the UK, Europe and from as far afield as Australia. There is a huge demand for this type of hands-on, immersive professional development from both sectors. Insights from the programme will be shared during an exhibition and symposium in the autumn.

The programme has been designed as an immersion into the challenges around investigating how we can build closer relationships, communications and systems with the design and waste sectors to make a circular economy really start to work.

More about the programme, visits and expert speakers can be found here.

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A new global symbol designed to identify reusable packaging and reuse systems worldwide has been unveiled today.

The new symbol was launched by PR3: The Global Alliance to Advance Reuse and its international coalition of businesses, governments, NGOs, designers and reuse operators.

In 2025, the Rebrand Reuse global design initiative set out to create a universal symbol for reuse systems and reusable packaging.

The initiative received 236 submissions from 29 countries across every continent except Antarctica and was selected through an international review, consumer research and legal evaluation process.

The winning symbol was created by Nicole Ascanio Rodriguez and Juan Navarrete, designers and co-founders of Epigrama Studios, based in Bogotá, Colombia.

The design was selected following multiple rounds of jury review and global market testing involving 1,275 respondents across 17 countries. It was also evaluated against criteria, including distinctiveness, memorability, and cultural adaptability.

It was also specifically appraised on whether the symbol could be clearly distinguished from the existing recycling symbol and its ‘chasing arrows’ Möbius loop.

The symbol is now being introduced on a diverse range of reusables and reuse infrastructure.

Juan Navarrete, Co-Founder & Designer, Epigrama Studios, said: “We wanted to create a symbol that communicates return, continuity and circulation – something simple enough to travel globally, but meaningful enough to represent a new relationship with materials and waste.”

“The symbol understands time not as a straight line, but as a spiral: returning, restoring and beginning again.”

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SUEZ has signed a £396 million, ten-year contract to operate and manage the Milton Keynes Waste Recovery Park (MKWRP).

Since September 2023, SUEZ has delivered household collections and street cleansing for Milton Keynes City Council.

The MKWRP facility treats up to 133,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste each year from Milton Keynes and West Northamptonshire and creates power equivalent to that used by 10% of Milton Keynes’ homes.

SUEZ has also announced it has signed an interim contract to operate the NESS energy from waste facility in Aberdeen.

The NESS facility can process up to 150,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste each year, which feeds a Combined Heat and Power facility with the ability to provide up to 10 MWth of heat to support Aberdeen City Council’s district heat network.

SUEZ is also starting construction on a new anaerobic digestion plant near Ellington in Northumberland.

Once operational towards the end of 2027, SUEZ says the plant will be able to process up to 50,000 tonnes of food waste annually.

The company also announced that construction is underway on a new battery recycling plant for large-format lithium batteries, which are often used in electric cars and e-scooters.

This project relocates the existing facility in Luton, operated by SUEZ since December 2023, to larger premises in Northamptonshire, which SUEZ says will increase capacity to 22,000 tonnes per year.

Xavier Girre, CEO of SUEZ, commented: “These new contracts with long-term clients and the development of critical facilities illustrate our commitment to serve our clients at all stages of the waste value chain: from collection, sorting, recycling, to thermal treatment, anaerobic digestion and gasification of biowaste.”

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Exchange For Change has confirmed the fees that will be paid to return point operators when England, Scotland and Northern Ireland launch their Deposit Return Scheme in October 2027.

The Return Handling Fee (RHF) is a payment made to retailers who operate a return point for consumers to return their in-scope beverage containers.

The fees will operate on a tiered basis across manual and automatic return points, and will provide for small to large volumes of returned containers.

Exchange For Change, the industry-led organisation delivering the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) across England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, has set the RHF at:

Manual return points

• 3p per container.

Automatic return points

• Tier 1 – 5p per container, up to 225,000 in-scope items returned annually.
• Tier 2 – 1.3p per container, for annual in-scope returns in excess of 225,000.

Exchange For Change says the RHF will be reviewed early next year, prior to the scheme going live, and will continue to be reviewed annually to take account of new data available from producers and retailers.

The annual review will use real data collected during the operation of the scheme, which will build a profile of the RHF and factors that impact it.

Russell Davies, Exchange For Change CEO, said: “We have taken on board a wide range of feedback provided by retailers, producers and trade bodies, and established a return handling fee that reflects the complexities of the UK retail landscape and ensures the scheme remains in balance.”

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Amid significant changes to national waste policy, Greg Paradowski, technical and operations director at Sherbourne Recycling, explains how the sector is evolving, developing and adapting to meet the legislative landscape of tomorrow.

The UK is currently experiencing some of the biggest changes to waste policy seen in more than two decades. From the implementation of Simpler Recycling legislation and the roll-out of packaging Extended Producer Responsibility (pEPR), to the design and implementation of a national Deposit Return Scheme (DRS), the way that recycling is categorised, collected, handled and financed is changing fast.

With the overarching goal of enabling collection uniformity, improving consumer engagement, influencing capture volumes and increasing national recycling rates, this momentum should be seen as a significant step forward. 

However, the introduction of new legislation is not simply a ‘green button solution’ and therefore requires broader, fundamental change, including changes to how we sort post-consumer packaging materials. This is driving a new dawn of recycling innovation – one that is widely defined by flexibility, agility and next-generation technology. 

Legislative change and evolving packaging design

In parallel with the introduction of new legislation, packaging design is being made to adapt. Take pEPR, as an example. With the financial and operational burden of household packaging waste shifting from the local authority level to a ‘producer pays’ model, brands are pushing for disruptive packaging alternatives that not only perform better from a sustainability standpoint, but that also minimise payable fees.

As a result, we’re seeing new formats and materials flooding the market, such as ‘paperised’ solutions, mono-material plastic formats, reusable systems and a huge rise in alternative materials (everything from seaweed-based packaging to water-soluble polystyrene substitutes). Achieving ‘green’ rated pEPR fees, these new solutions are typically lighter and designed to minimise unnecessary waste. 

But what happens when this new packaging reaches the recycling supply chain? Well, in principle, you’d expect them to be far easier to recycle. However, in practice, this isn’t necessarily the case. After all, many material recovery facilities (MRFs) have been optimised to sort the packaging materials that have become popularised over the past decade, not necessarily the innovations driven by evolving legislation.

As such, a ‘paperised’ solution, such as a cardboard bottle with a plastic liner, will likely travel along a recycling line, be identified as a paper-based item and baled alongside other paper products. From here, the bale will be loaded onto a lorry and sent to an offtaker ready for reprocessing.

Although relatively harmless on a small scale, these internal plastic layers are considered a contaminant and, if received in scale, can lead to rejections. It’s an interesting paradox whereby sustainable packaging may actually be contaminating the recycling stream.

This is not a failing of packaging design, or of new legislation, but a wake-up call that recycling infrastructure needs to anticipate how materials will evolve to achieve compliance. The MRFs of tomorrow will need to be more agile than ever before to keep ahead of the rapidly developing marketplace. 

The revolutionary new rules of AI

While this example sounds concerning, it must be said that the UK’s recycling infrastructure is evolving fast. MRF operators are investing heavily in pioneering new technology, which is enabling the acceleration of new packaging designs.

AI and robotics, for example, are being adopted at the initial development phases of site development to build innovation, agility and flexibility into their very core. This allows operators to not only handle the market of today, but also effectively optimise their plants in line with changing legislation in the future.

Take the same example of a cardboard bottle with a plastic liner, but replace a traditional, analogue MRF with a next-generation digital MRF featuring innovative new technologies. An MRF designed around AI and robotics can effectively be ‘trained’. This means that, within just a few days, technology can be programmed to identify the format as a different product. 

As such, it won’t be baled with other mono paper materials, but instead will be identified as a mixed material product. As a result, rather than contaminating a pure cardboard bale, it can be sorted correctly. 

This is where the recycling sector is adapting fast. At Sherbourne Recycling, for example, training and optimising our AI-powered plant has become part of our daily routine. Setting high-quality standards enables us to deliver exceptional products to our UK offtakers. 

The recycling sector of tomorrow

As the recycling industry continues to adapt to the legislative landscape of the future, investing in innovation has never been more important. Operators are moving fast with significant investment in robotics and automation, ensuring that higher recycling rates for household waste look firmly achievable.

However, while the progress the sector has already made is positive, we must be mindful that some infrastructure is reaching the end of its life. From here, investing in new sorting facilities becomes a mission-critical priority. 

Retrofitting offers a solution, but the reasons for designing a site with AI and robotics central to operations are compelling. The investment not only futureproofs the site so that it is agile enough to adapt to material, market and regulatory changes, but it also delivers a quality product that the UK market demands.

The analogue sites of the past were perfectly suitable for the requirements of yesterday, but the waste management infrastructure of tomorrow needs to be far more nimble to navigate changing legislative requirements. With AI, you can customise your plant to suit exacting requirements – be that offtaker-led or legislation-led.

MRFs like Sherbourne demonstrate that the technology and processes are already available to effectively deliver upon future targets, but more work now needs to be done across the industry to ensure digital sites become standard. Achieving this will prove pivotal in creating the recycling landscape required for the next 25 years.

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The University of Edinburgh has licensed a gold and copper recovery process that it says enables cleaner extraction of high‑value metals from e‑waste.

The Gold Copper Diamide Extraction (GCDE) process uses organic compounds to selectively extract metals from discarded electronics.

Developed by Professor Jason Love and Professor Carole Morrison in the School of Chemistry, and commercialised with support from Edinburgh Innovations, the process has been licenced to mineral processing company Lithium Universe.

E‑waste is one of the world’s fastest-growing hazardous waste streams; however, only around 20% is recycled using environmentally sound methods.

Traditional e‑waste processing relies on furnace smelting above 1,200°C or aggressive leaching, both energy‑intensive and polluting.

The GCDE process instead uses low‑temperature hydrometallurgy and small, reusable organic ligands to target metals in sequence, under mild conditions and avoiding cyanide, mercury and organic solvent extraction.

Under an exclusive worldwide licence, Lithium Universe will deploy and sub-license the technology globally as part of its expanding precious metals recycling strategy.

Dr Susan Bodie, Director of Innovation Development and Licensing at Edinburgh Innovations, commented: “This breakthrough from the University of Edinburgh reinforces the strategic expansion of our Precious Metals Recycling Division into high-value recovery technologies.”

“By integrating selective metal recovery with sustainable processing, Lithium Universe Limited strengthens its competitive position in circular-economy solutions for gold, silver, and copper recovery.”

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CIWM (Chartered Institution of Wastes Management) Design Council, WRAP, and URGE Collective, have partnered with waste management company Biffa and retail business Decathlon for the next phases of the Design Skills for embedding circularity programme.

The Design Skills for Embedding Circularity pilot programme is now gearing up for a design sprint that will focus on ‘designing out waste’.

An intensive 6-week deep dive, exploring challenges and barriers to circularity through both business, design and waste and resources lenses. The Sprint is part of an innovative pilot project funded by CIWM that links professional designers with resources and waste operators to embed designing out waste principles into everyday design practice.

The design cohort have spent the last four months visiting industrial waste facilities guided by circular economy expert Sophie Thomas.

They have observed technical processes and met waste resource experts across the country, including at Sherbourne Recycling’s Super MRF, SWEEEP’s waste electrical and electronic equipment recycling plant, DS Smith’s largest UK recycled papermill, Enfinium’s energy from waste plant, Biffa’s Edmonton MRF, Enovert’s landfill sites in Gloucestershire, and SUEZ’s Renew Hub in Manchester.

They have also visited Decathlon’s London HQ, and Allermuir’s furniture remanufacturing hub in Manchester to explore how circular business models are being realised.

Each site visit and expert session revealed myth busting facts concerning how products are designed and manufactured for recovery, reuse or recycling and the barriers to circularity.

These insights range from: the amount of lost material at the MRF stage from size or material complexity, coloured PET ruling out recycling, problematic waste arriving at MRFs including vapes, textiles, nappies, cookware, and the extremely limited intervention points for repair or reuse between user and industrial waste sorting.

Dan Cooke, Director of Policy, Communications and External Affairs at CIWM, said that policy is moving in the right direction and will ‘increasingly nudge’ businesses towards circular models.

“However, a vital element for progress is cross-sector collaboration and expertise – designers who understand what happens to a product at end of life, and resources and waste professionals who can influence design thinking upstream,” Cooke continued.

“These connections are important in helping to move the world beyond waste. In just a few weeks, this cohort is moving from waste facility floor to design studio, and knowledge is now being applied to live challenges from Biffa and Decathlon.”

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Dean Warren, CRWM, MCIWM, Maintenance Mechanic/Sustainability coordinator at Nuclear Restoration Services, talks about his professional path embedding sustainability in nuclear decommissioning.

My professional path is positioned at the intersection of practical engineering and sustainable resource management.

In May 2021, I joined Magnox – now Nuclear Restoration Services (NRS) – as a maintenance mechanic at a nuclear waste processing facility in Oxfordshire.

Simultaneously, I achieved Chartered Resource and Waste Manager (CRWM) status with CIWM. While these paths may not seem to naturally align, they together shape my approach to sustainability in one of the UK’s most highly regulated environments.

The idea of sustainability has consistently been a central theme in my life, weaving together many of my passions and interests into a cohesive framework.

My Fellowships with institutions like the Royal Society of Arts, which, since its beginning, has always supported a daring notion: that human creativity, when cultivated in the right environment, can address the planet’s most pressing challenges, is something that resonates profoundly with me.

The Royal Anthropological Institute, which serves as a nexus for art, anthropology, and sustainability, enables me to engage with remarkable individuals who are part of the environmental anthropology and sustainability conversation.

My Fellowship with the Linnean Society of London, acknowledged as the oldest academic institution dedicated to natural history, offers a remarkable opportunity to delve into insights concerning nature, climate, and conservation.

Additionally, as a member of the Society of Operations Engineers (SOE), which is dedicated to promoting sustainable engineering practices in the industry, I have been inspired to apply for Registered Environmental Practitioner status through their organisation.

Each of these institutions represents a thread in the ever-evolving tapestry that shapes my comprehension of how sustainability can be implemented and how they are entwined.

I am based at the NRS Harwell site, formerly the Atomic Energy Research Establishment, one of the most historically significant nuclear research facilities in Europe.

As the site approaches its 80th anniversary, decommissioning continues alongside a major programme of land release for redevelopment, supporting the growth of the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus.

This transition, from nuclear research to future-focused innovation, captures the essence of sustainable legacy management.

In my day-to-day role, I work within a small maintenance team keeping essential systems operational. Maintenance activities inevitably generate waste, and in the nuclear sector, this demands rigorous control.

Waste arising from even routine tasks must be fully characterised, documented, monitored, and approved before it can be transferred.

My CRWM background enables me to support this process by ensuring waste streams are appropriately classified, documentation is robust, and opportunities to minimise waste are identified early.

Beyond my operational role, I am also one of two Sustainability Coordinators at Harwell. In this capacity, I work with colleagues on site and across NRS to embed the organisation’s Sustainability Strategy into practical delivery.

Each NRS site faces different challenges and opportunities: some lead on biodiversity enhancement, others focus on net zero initiatives, but all contribute to socio-economic sustainability within their local communities.

What stands out is that sustainability in nuclear decommissioning is inherently collaborative. Progress depends on engineers, waste professionals, health physicists, environmental specialists and project teams working together to deliver safe, compliant and sustainable outcomes – often in the absence of historical design information or precedent.

Professional development continues to play an important role in my approach. Alongside CRWM, I have applied for Advanced Practitioner status with the Circular Economy Institute (CEI), reflecting a commitment to continual learning and the practical application of sustainability principles.

Sustainability in nuclear decommissioning is not abstract or theoretical. It is built into everyday decisions, from waste segregation and reuse to long-term land stewardship and community benefit.

For me, being a CIWM member provides both the professional framework and the confidence to apply resource and waste management principles where they matter most – on the ground, at the site level, and throughout the decommissioning lifecycle.

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