Natural Stone Sales, the Matlock, Derbyshire, company that have taken over the extraction of Mandale Derbyshire Fossil limestone at Once a Week Quarry, are one of just 13 companies to have received a certificate from Margaret Becket, Secretary of State for the Environment, for their waste minimisation and environmental best practice.

The companies that received certificates were the best of 122 that took part in a pilot Supply Chain Partnership Forum last year run by Envirowise, the Department of Trade & Industry/Department of the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs-sponsored operation that promotes waste minimisation and environmental best practice.

Natural Stone Sales supply the Peak Park Authority, Once A Week Quarry being in the Peak Park, and it was the Authority that proposed Natural Stone Sales for the scheme.

Under the scheme, companies work with Envirowise consultants to devise ways to minimise waste and reduce environmental damage. The participants regularly report back to a committee monitoring progress.

Kelsey says the changes made at Once A Week have saved Natural Stone Sales about £60,000 so far and are projected to produce savings of £100,000 over two or three years.

Taking part in the scheme led to a significant changes in quarry operations that produced improved overall process efficiency and savings through reduced haulage, re-work and rejects.

The changes included environmentally friendly practices of water management (treatment and recycling) and energy management (reducing the amount of power used and switching to beneficial tariffs) and reducing waste.

Energy was saved by changing working practices to minimise the number of times and distances materials are moved. Waste was minimised by increasing the range of products. For example, the left over material from block production is now cut up as walling stone and the waste from that is sold as dry stone walling. Much of what remains after that is sold as rockery stone.

Kelsey says that about 50% of the stone from the quarry was previously waste and that has now been reduced to about 30%.

At the same time as presenting the most successful companies in the pilot scheme with their certificates at London\'s Haberdashers Hall, Margaret Beckett announced that the scheme would now roll out under the name of Retail Therapy with companies like Boots, CentreParcs, W H Smiths, Safeway, Halfords and Manchester United Football Club.