rio - kn

Where in Scotland does the public sector, private sector, community, investors and third sector come together to build innovative, industry defining ideas? The answer is CivTech®.

A unique accelerator programme run by the Scottish Government that empowers public sector organisations to lay out specific challenges for private sector companies to solve. 

My name is Jack and I’m developing our answer to Challenge 6, set by National Services Scotland, “How can we transform the re-use of products for NHS Scotland?”. It was a pleasure to talk with Derek Mackay MSP (Cabinet Secretary for Finance, Economy & Fair Work) about Scotland's growing circular economy...but I wish I had worn a smarter jumper(!)

Ditto Sustainability has been chosen to transform the re-use of products for NHS Scotland. Reducing waste, providing cost savings, and developing skilled jobs; stimulating the Scottish circular economy.

Dan Botterill, CEO of Ditto Sustainability, explains how Artificial intelligence (AI) can help towards achieving a more circular economy.

The 4th Industrial revolution conjures imagery of all kinds of technology adaptations and evolutions; driverless cars, the Internet of Things (IoT), robotics and AI – the last of which underpins many applications in this area. The wide scale adoption of AI massively divides opinion. The inability of machine learning and probabilistic AI technologies to ‘self account’ or ‘explain’ how they have reached their conclusions is a very prominent concern for many, particularly those writing the law...

For those of us who’ve worked in or with the waste industry for a while, it certainly feels like times are changing. A public obsession with single use plastics, rallying cries for better food waste segregation and management, and the emergence of the new agenda in town: the circular economy.

So what does this mean for the oft maligned waste management contractor? How does its role need to adapt and evolve to respond to the progressively more outspoken ethical consumers?

Around 20,000 recycling, waste, resources and sustainability professionals will head to Birmingham’s NEC for RWM Exhibition on 12-13 September 2018. The industry’s most influential names and organisations will attend to discover the environmental innovations shaping the sector.

Join us at stand 4G101. We're also hosting two rather distinct seminars on Wednesday and Thursday...

This edie insight report, produced in collaboration with Ditto Sustainability, provides clear, practical steps that can be taken by sustainability and CSR professionals to embed the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within their organisation’s business strategy.

You can download our report from edie below...

The recent report from the Renewable Energy Association (REA) that Defra was not considering mandatory food waste collections in England will disappoint many and make others happy.

The losers will be the Anaerobic Digestion (AD) and compost plants, starved of quality food waste to treat, with many close to bankruptcy. The winners will be the landfill and incinerator operators that will have another 4-5 million tonnes of food waste annually to burn or dump. And with waste producers paying some £120 a tonne to send the waste to their plants, it adds up to a significant amount of money.

In between the winners and losers are the councils. As LARAC  (The Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee) quite rightly say...

People have a perception of AI (Artificial Intelligence) which is negative – they are afraid of what robots and the invasion of privacy through technologies will do to our lives. They fear jobs will be lost. They also have only a vague idea of what 'circular economy' means. Indeed Dan Botterill (Ditto Sustainability CEO) recently asked a room of (100+) people to define 'circular economy' in ten seconds. Just four people thought they could. So combining AI (fear) with circular economy (ignorance) equals a lack of understanding of how one can develop the other. 

That is a gigantic, missed opportunity...

We had a really interesting time together at Ditto Sustainability's event on 27 June at the City of London offices of investor, IP Group. The subject of discussion was 'Will the Circular Economy save the Planet?' and about 50 of us crowded the rooftop room. I acted as compere for this afternoon meeting, and this was really fun because the speakers were well informed, sharp, and up to the task of replying to some rather provocative questions from me and the audience.

Here's the video of the day...