Environmental Policy

We believe that all our activities and operations have an impact upon the environment and that environmental issues are of critical importance.

This policy commits Aldershaw to continuous environmental improvement, to be environmentally friendly, to demonstrate sound environmental performance, to prevent pollution and take actions that will lead to environmental sustainability. 

It applies to all our activities and their affect on our employees, contractors, suppliers, customers, the general public, and the world environment.

We will achieve our policy objectives by continually striving to:-

1) Measure and monitor the impact of all our activities upon the environment.

2) analyse and reduce our impact upon the environment and in particular our:-

Efficient use of:-

And to minimise the:-

3) Plan our activities, services and products to minimise any adverse impact upon the environment.

4) Comply and wherever possible exceed the requirements of legislative environmental standards.

5) Involve and Train our employees to be environmentally aware, environmentally responsible and continuously work towards environmental sustainability.

6) Encourage all persons and Organisations with which we have contact to become environmentally aware and environmentally responsible.

7) Communicate and whenever appropriate share our environmental experiences and resulting techniques and Solutions.

How do we do this?

Firstly we try to be as efficient as we can in the use of all our raw materials, energy, water, and our own labour.

We generate our own electricity for all motive power.and recover the heat from it’s generation for use in our dryers, just as we do the wasted heat from our kilns during the firing process.

We recycle all tile waste whether fired or unfired straight back into the body of the tiles which is also beneficial to the quality of the finished tile and the efficiency of production.

We harvest the rainwater off the factory roof for use as process water in the mixing of clay for hand moulding.

Our packaging is top quality and we financially encourage our customers to return it for reuse, where practical we reuse paper for non-confidential use and shred the remaining for use as packaging.

We own and manage sufficient woodland to sequester more than six times more carbon than we cause to be produced in our consumption of fuels. This woodland is managed in a sustainable way, the coppiced woodland is used to make fencing and other woodland products which fix the carbon for a prolonged period of time. Brushwood is stacked in brash piles to encourage fauna by creating additional natural habitats.

Our new office and showroom is also planned to harvest rainwater for wc flushing. The wastewater will be treated on site to ensure that it is pure enough to be put straight into the local watercourse. Hot water is to be provided by solar panels.