London North Eastern Railway

After speaking to numerous companies, LNER decided that Valpak were the best partner to help them to achieve Zero Waste to Landfill certification for their Head Office in York, 11 railway stations and servicing depot.

LNER face several challenges in terms of the waste they receive from trains, which is mostly post-consumer and can be waste from other trains, not just theirs. This means that the business has little control of the waste it receives at stations. The scope of the certification only covers waste streams that LNER has direct contractual control over.

Valpak randomly selected three stations to audit: York, Grantham and Doncaster, as well as five of the business’s sites, which involved checking that LNER were doing the right things, as well as the data the trainline operator held. We also verified the information provided with LNER’s waste contractors to make sure it matched up.

During the audits, we identified that customer communications and signage wasn’t consistent; this has now been renewed to encourage passengers to recycle more. Another recommendation was that coffee cups as a waste stream could be collected for recycling.

LNER now has a coffee cup collection and recycling contract in place. LNER obtained Zero Waste to Landfill Certification for 2019 and became the first trainline to accomplish this.

This fantastic achievement will mean their efforts will be recognised by the Executive Safety Security Sustainability Board and has proved that they’re doing what they’ve been asked to do.

LNER is now looking to achieve 2020 and 2021 Zero Waste to Landfill Certification and have asked Valpak to help them again.