How Vet Nurse Lindsey and Mayne Veterinary Clinic are Leading the Way in Sustainability
“Every staff member set a Planet Pledge to personally change what we could to make a positive impact on the environment.”
– Lindsey Raven Emrich, Vet Nurse
My commitment to sustainability began in earnest after the birth of my daughter. As a new mother, I was determined to reduce the environmental footprint of all the disposables that often come with raising a child. I knew that being mindful of the Earth’s resources was essential, and that passion quickly extended to my work life.
Implementing Sustainable Practices at Mayne Veterinary Clinic
My commitment to sustainability began in earnest after the birth of my daughter. As a new mother, I was determined to reduce the environmental footprint of all the disposables that often come with raising a child. I knew that being mindful of the Earth’s resources was essential, and that passion quickly extended to my work life.
Implementing Sustainable Practices at Mayne Veterinary Clinic
Making sustainability a priority at work was a natural extension of my personal values. Fortunately, the team at Mayne Veterinary Clinic shared the same vision, and we began our journey toward creating a greener veterinary practice. Together, we focused on implementing eco-friendly initiatives to reduce waste, conserve resources, and promote environmental responsibility.
Key Steps We Took to Make Our Veterinary Clinic More Sustainable:
Recycling and Waste Reduction: We started by adding multiple recycling bins to the staff room and assessing areas where we could reduce our environmental impact. This helped us increase recycling rates and minimize waste.
The Green Team Initiative: We created a dedicated “Green Team” to brainstorm and implement further sustainable practices throughout the clinic. Every team member set a Planet Pledge, committing to make eco-friendly changes in their daily routine at work.Investors in the Environment Certification:
Joining the Investors in the Environment (IIE) program provided us with a solid framework to guide our sustainability efforts. This initiative helped us evaluate our progress and gave us the tools to make measurable improvements.
Achieving Bronze Certification for Sustainability
Our efforts paid off when Mayne Veterinary Clinic received the Bronze certification from Investors in the Environment in 2020. This recognition not only acknowledged our achievements in sustainability but also motivated us to continue striving for a more eco-conscious future.
By integrating sustainable practices into our veterinary clinic, we’ve been able to provide high-quality care for pets while also reducing our impact on the environment. At Mayne Veterinary Clinic, we believe that every small change counts when it comes to creating a greener world.
The ideas keep flowing
Our practice already did a lot but there’s always more we can do, so we added to this list and the ideas just keep flowing. Among a lot of changes we have made, turning a waste ground into a nature and staff haven using all repurposed materials was one of the most fun! We installed a water butt onto the garage to water the raised beds, and grew hollyhocks for the bees and nasturtiums. We held a seed challenge – all the staff planted seeds and we set a competition to see who’s grew first! Staff covid PPE has been recycled using a ReWorked collection bin, which is now full and will be collected this week. We switched from plastic urine collection beads to Medicat hydrophobic sand and regularly review all of our procurement. We also recruited our local Ecargo representative giving clients the option for pedal power delivery for prescription and food deliveries.
Our newest plans are a pet shirt and buster collar hire system – we’re brainstorming a buy back system. The idea that pet shirts and buster collars can be disposable is awful so we are working on that idea at the moment. In addition, we’re looking at carbon off setting our care plans.
Opportunities to help our planet are around every corner, with a little creativity and a supportive team we all really can make a difference and its going superbly well so far!
Lindsey Raven Emrich
Mayne Veterinary Clinic, Colchester, Essex
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