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A34 Chieveley M4 Junction 13 Improvement Project description Background This is a Design and Build project for highway network improvement to provide full grade separation of the M4/A34 junction and remove the last ‘bottleneck’ on the A34 between the M3 and M40 Motorways. The contract value is approximately £38M. Waste Minimisation Activity The scheme has been developed as a sustainable transport solution with focus on continuing the sustainable thought process in the planning, design, construction, hand-over and maintenance aspects of this much needed national asset. Materials Targeted The requirement for imported virgin aggregates was reduced by 50,000t by use of in-situ stabilisation of soils, use of recycled demolition rubble and reuse of redundant carriageway. Project Drivers for Waste Minimisation Cost benefits including avoidance of Aggregates Levy, Landfill Tax & other waste disposal costs Internal company policy requirement EMS

Project profile Location: Chieveley, England Project Duration (in relation to the described activities): April 2003 to May 2004 Client: Highways Agency Key Statistics: 50,000 tonne reduction in primary material requirement. Company Profile Costain Ltd Contractor Project Partners: Mott MacDonald (Designer) RPS Planning Transport & Environment (Environmental Project Manager) Gifford WSP (Clients Site Representative)

Project Approach to Waste Minimisation and Sustainable Use of Resources

Construction Phase Activities:

Enabling waste minimisation and the use of non-primary materials:

• A project specific Waste Management Plan was developed and operated to ensure that waste streams were identified, dealt with appropriately and documented accordingly
• In-situ soil stabilisation was used to reduce the need for imported virgin aggregate as capping
• Recycled demolition rubble was imported as capping instead of virgin aggregate
• 100% of redundant carriageway was recycled by crushing and screening for use in the new carriageway

Using local approaches:
From a choice of local suppliers only one was picked as a supplier of recycled demolition rubble. Efforts were then concentrated on ensuring that this single supplier supplied a “quality” product to meet the project needs.

Company practice and management in supporting waste minimisation and improved approaches to resources use:

• Materials Management and Waste Minimisation are part of the mandatory Costain Group Environmental Management System Procedures used on all Costain projects
• The use of these procedures was regularly verified by internal and external auditors
• Costains company Environmental Manager and the projects full time Safety, Health and Environmental Advisor regularly presented tool box talks to all site staff which included waste minimisation and sustainability topics

Better handling of materials:
A weekly environmental site inspection was carried out. This inspection included checks to ensure that the project Waste Management Plan was being followed and materials were being stored and segregated correctly.

Good practice in quantifying, costing and recording data on wastes and materials:
The site specific Construction Environmental Management Plan used included Waste as an objective with a target for 50% of material disposed off site in skips to be recycled.

Using specifications appropriate to enabling the use of recycled and secondary materials:
The Highways Agency Specification for Highway Works allows the use of recycled aggregate and asphalt.

Lessons Learned, Benefits and Barriers

• A project specific Waste Management Plan should be in place at a very early stage in the construction process and all levels of staff on site made aware of its implications and targets.
• For a one off major project the supply from the local market of materials that can be recycled or used more sustainably in construction applications will be limited. Our specifications allowed more recycled materials to be used than was actually available. The local shortage was due to both a lack of quality and quantity.

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