Page 9 - Eclipse - Autumn/Winter 2023

GENERAL NEWS

• We’ve finally found a use for old STUDENT PROJECTS
Student Union t-shirts – we have Student (RP2) projects with a
donated them to The Catalina sustainability focus are being offered
Society, who are using them to polish to students. Projects that have been
‘Miss Pick Up’, a 1943 seaplane!
completed include:
Alongside these initiatives, we are • Single use plastic in the Queen
looking at ways we can reduce the Mother Hospital for Animals (QMHA)
amount of waste we produce including:
• Impact of anaesthetics on
• Using reusable kennel liners, which climate change
has led to a 40% reduction in single
use incontinence pads. • Waste management at the QMHA
• Trialling printing names on • What actions vets can take to
uniforms, which can then be reduce the impact on climate change
removed with a spray. We are currently working on several
• Using reusable theatre hats. projects to analyse our waste streams
and calculate how much waste we could
• We now have jacket potato bars in recycle, and areas for improvement. We
the restaurant, which has reduced are also monitoring the positive impact our
the need for individual pots for the land management has had on biodiversity.
fillers, such as cheese etc, reducing
the amount of single use plastic.
• Food waste is minimised where
possible through reusing left over
vegetables for soup, fruit peelings to
make flavoured water etc.

BOLTONS PARK FARM
We are reducing the soy in the diet of our
cows to lower the carbon footprint of our
milk, which we are continuously monitoring.
To help reduce food miles, we have a farm
shop selling our own eggs and sheep
fleeces and locally produced honey (our
own soon, hopefully) and jam. There will
also soon be a milk vending machine
installed, with reusable RVC glass milk
bottles on sale. The milk will also be used
in our catering outlets. You can find out
more about this on page 73.
We are taking part in a pilot scheme
called Farming for Carbon and Nature,
to look at how much carbon is being
captured in our soil and the impact our
farming methods have on wildlife. As part
of this, RVC students are offered the
opportunity to undertake soil monitoring.
This is being done in conjunction with
the Wildlife Ecology course.

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