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March 2009 Welcome to the March edition of E News. Spring is certainly in the air, and we in the office are keenly looking forward to getting out on the water and spreading The Green Blue message as we all prepare for the season ahead. It's been full on here with Sarah, our Project Manager, speaking at seminars and running workshops all over the country. She has even been to Nova Scotia to inspire the skippers from Tall Ships International to influence their crews to be more environmentally aware. So what’s included in this edition? Well, we are very excited about our new photography competition entitled, The Good, The Bad and The Funny (see below for details).There is a roundup of the volunteer training day that took place recently in Scotland and you can find out the latest news on our recycling program and the Volvo Eco Challenge. For the business minded amongst you, then have a read of trade talk and check out your environmental legal compliance with our new free online service www.marinetoolkit.co.uk. We would also like to say a huge well done Dee has worked with The Green Blue on a number of projects since becoming an ambassador in September 2007. She did the honours for us as she presented our first ever environmental award for excellence to Dean and Reddyhoff’s Gosport marina for their recycling efforts. She has also been great at helping to promote the work of The Green Blue’s recycling program, and has lead the way in her own office with introducing a paper free working environment. The Green Blue would like to say a big well done to Dee and her team. We look forward to working with her again soon and wish her luck in her future endeavours. 
To visit Dee’s website, go to www.deecaffari.co.uk |
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The GreenBlue is proud to launch marinetoolkit.co.uk Designed for managers of marine leisure businesses and leaders of boat clubs, The Marine Tool Kit will help you to make more of you club or business by reducing your waste, increasing efficiency and saving money. Environmental issues are becoming increasingly significant to all types of businesses and environmental performance is important to customers. The marine tool kit will keep you on the right side of the law (and could save you from forking out hard earned profits as fines) as it will highlight if you are not compliant with legislation. It refers to the best practice guidelines of the Environmental Code of Practice. Easy to use and informative, the marine tool kit is essentially a check list. You work through a series of simple questions under various headings and view your performance. The checklist does not need to be completed in one sitting as there is a clever facility to save your answers so that you can work through it at you own pace. And what’s more the service is free and completely confidential too! What are you waiting for?
Go to www.marinetoolkit.co.uk and have a go yourself. |
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Following the launch of the Volvo Eco Challenge last year, we received a fantastic number of entries from clubs looking to green up their activities. The Volvo Eco challenge, sponsored by Volvo Cars UK, and supported by The Green Blue, was established to provide individual grants to help Volvo RYA Championship Clubs make environmental improvements to their club houses or sailing activities. Small grants of up to £1000 were up for grabs and 23 clubs were successful in receiving funding. Not surprisingly, recycling was high on the agenda for many clubs such as Beaver Sailing Club in Doncaster, but wildlife and biodiversity, energy saving and resource efficiency were also found to be key issues that clubs wanted to tackle. Burton Sailing Club won a grant to help them collect rainwater runoff from the club house to use for washing down boats, whilst Derwent Reservoir Sailing Club are now going to be able to carry out a survey of plant and animal species on their site. Chris Packham, television personality, and Volvo Eco Challenge Ambassador, helped to launch the grant scheme and will be keenly following the clubs progress. The Green Blue will be working closely with all the clubs to help them make the best use of this great opportunity. Keep checking the website for news about how the clubs are getting on and news of this year’s grant scheme. Recycling Update Our Man Dan, The Green Blue Recycling Officer, has been hard at it working with dozens of clubs and marine businesses to install recycling facilities, and negotiate waste disposal contracts. Since he started in June 2008, Dan has worked with 14 marinas such as the MDL Group, Premier’s Brighton Marina (the UK’s largest marina) and is currently working with Royal Clarence Marina in Gosport. He has also been busy liaising with eight sailing clubs. 16 of the 23 Volvo RYA Champion Clubs that received grants from the Volvo Eco Challenge fund, requested help with recycling facilities, two of these clubs (Rutland SC and Fishers Green SC in Hertfordshire) are just about to launch their new scheme. Recycling facilities at RYA House have also been scrutinised and improved. So far these clubs and businesses have diverted a whopping 6 million litres of waste from landfill sites – a fantastic achievement! The recycling program, originally focussing on the Southern part of the country, has been so successful that the Environment Agency, whose grant support got the programme running, have requested that the scheme be pushed out nationwide.
If you would like advice on implementing a recycling scheme at your club or marina then please contact Dan on 02380 604242 or email dan.reading@thegreenblue.org.uk |
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The Green Blue has now recruited its first volunteers in Scotland and has recently held a very successful volunteer training day in Scotland. Kindly hosted by Royal Gourock Yacht Club, new recruits travelled from across Scotland to participate in the one-day training event. The volunteers will help Julia Christie, Project Officer Scotland, in spreading environmental awareness effectively across Scotland’s boating communities. "Volunteers are key to getting the message out to boaters" said Julia. "We are hoping they will make us much more effective at raising awareness by distributing publications, providing club liaison and attending sailing events and boat shows." Sarah Black (Project Manager) and Helen Waterhouse (Development Officer) provided training and gave an inspirational overview of The Green Blue, its achievements so far and the challenges ahead. Volunteers were trained on The Green Blue's six main areas of work: Oil and Fuel, Cleaning and Maintenance, Appreciating Wildlife, Resource Efficiency, Waste Management and Sewage. The importance of volunteers, what volunteers do and the resources available to them were also covered. The training equipped the volunteers with the knowledge required to help the boating community “make the environment second nature” as The Green Blue tag line reads. Aisa Nebreda, who works for the GRAB Trust in Lochgilphead said "the training was very inspirational and delivered enthusiastically. It was interactive and I particularly enjoyed the games and activities."
For more information of volunteering please contact Helen.Waterhouse@thegreenblue.org.uk. |
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Volvo Eco Challenge
6 New volunteers for Scotland |
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The Good, The Bad and The Funny They say a picture is worth a thousand words so in our mission to promote good environmental practice to boaters and marine businesses, we are looking for some great photos to help us get our message across. The Green Blue would like you to send us your photographs of anything to do with the boating environment under three titles - The Good, The Bad and The Funny. It could be a stunning sunset, a leaky oil drum*, a funny moment onboard the boat or it could be a community clean up at your local club, something horrible such as discarded balloons, or an interesting wildlife image! Whatever you think fits we are looking for inspiring and special photographs. Sarah Black, The Green Blue Project Manager said: “They say a picture paints a thousand words so in our mission to promote good environmental practice to boaters and marine businesses, we are looking for some great photos to help us get our message across. “We want to educate, inspire and motivate the public and our photography competition is an ideal way to create a sense of wonderment and fun that will move people to take action.” There will be prizes for all three categories – The Good, The Bad and The Funny with two age groups for each category, under and over 16’s. There will also be an overall prize and a special celebration at the PSP Southampton Boat Show. Your winning photo may even feature on the front page of the RYA magazine or make its way onto the pages of the RYA and BMF websites! So get cracking and you could be winning one of our fabulous prizes, perhaps it will be lunch with Dee Caffari MBE or a free wash and scrub with Dean and Reddyhoff at their Portland Marina (check our website for updates). You can download the application form and rules of entry at our website, www.thegreenblue.org.uk or email us at info@thegreenblue.org.uk. The closing date for applications is the 24th August. *Please note any serious environmental issues such as oil leaks should be reported to the relevant authorities (see our website for contact details) ** Printed images cannot be returned |
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