Wates Residential has strengthened its commitment towards the environment by banning single-use plastic cups on its construction sites.

The developer has already launched a pilot scheme at its 141-home mixed-use Abbey Area redevelopment in Camden, with reusable bottles brought from a social enterprise and distributed to the entire workforce, who can use fresh water stations to fill them up.

Previously, the redevelopment used an estimated 120,000 cups per year, which cost just over £1,300. Over the next decade, Wates estimates that swapping to reusable bottles could save approximately £4,350 per site, as well as reducing landfill by around 5,000kg and helping to reduce litter and marine pollution.

The decision to move to reusable bottles follows the BBC's documentary Blue Planet II, which highlighted the severe effects plastic pollution is having on the marine environment.

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The Group has already made a number of commitments by 2020 including protecting and enhancing biodiversity, building sustainability knowledge, procuring responsibly sourced materials and working to shape the industry on energy efficient standards.

Denise Southard, a document controller and community champion for Wates who proposed the environmentally-friendly scheme, said: "After watching Blue Planet II and seeing the horrific damage that plastic can have on the environment, I was inspired to encourage others to reduce their plastic waste.

"Wates Residential has been extremely supportive in this and I am proud to work for a company that has embraced my idea so whole-heartedly. I can't believe how easy it was to implement a simple swap from disposable cups to reusable bottles and hope other businesses are encouraged to do the same."

Paul Nicholls, Managing Director of Wates Residential South, said: "Reducing our single-use plastics waste is something we feel very passionate about at Wates Residential and this great initiative from Denise is another step on our journey towards doing that.

"We hope this commitment will not only drive change across our sites, but will also lead to new ambitions in the wider industry. We believe cutting down on avoidable plastic waste is the right thing to do and we are proud to be doing our bit to protect our Blue Planet."

(LM/MH)