Evaluation of the Resource Efficiency Advice and Support project

Background

The Envirowise Resource Efficiency Advice and Support Project aimed to provide resource efficiency services to medium and large enterprises in Wales. It was designed to provide advice and support to organisations relating to: waste prevention, increased reuse of materials and increased recycling. This was carried out through specialist on-site support to organisations that were identified as having large waste outputs. In addition online support was provided to a set quota of organisations where two modules of course work were required to be completed.

M·E·L Research was commissioned to carry out an evaluation of the project with the following main objectives:

• Identify whether and to what extent the Envirowise Resource Efficiency project met its aims of reducing the target organisations’ waste to landfill and increasing their reuse and recycling of materials.
• Understand the impact of the project by establishing what resource efficiency improvements the target organisations would have achieved without the Envirowise support.
• Identify which aspects of the Envirowise project were successful and which aspects worked less well.

Methodology

Organisations that had received the resource efficiency support from Envirowise were firstly contacted by the Welsh Government to give them notice of the forthcoming evaluation. Once notice had been given they were contacted through semi-structured telephone interviews from our in-house interviewing unit in Birmingham. The key themes of the interviews covered:

• Business profile – Activities and number of employees
• Respondent profile – Job role, reason for undertaking support, expectations from support
• Support received – Online or onsite
• Changes implemented after support – Engagement with colleagues, ease of making changes, greatest impact
• Satisfaction with the support

Outcomes

The support had a detectable impact on resource savings overall that varied by the type of organisation. It also helped all organisations who implemented resource efficiency measures to take action sooner. There was a good satisfaction rate with the support, with onsite visits being favoured.