Member Article

Nottingham landfill experts fly out to fill Swedish skills gap

A Swedish multinational has called on specialists from a Nottingham firm to help design and manage a landfill reclamation scheme.

Two waste management experts from Caulmert were flown out to provide design expertise and advice to Sweco, which is the third largest environmental consultancy in Europe, and employs 16,000 Europe-wide.

Jonathan Clark and Elena Wasikowski (pictured) were appointed to assist with the remote council-owned landfill site, in a forest in southern Sweden, and to develop design options and a final scheme for its long-term restoration.

Unlike the UK, Sweden no longer landfills waste except mining waste. As a result, expertise in designing, managing and restoring landfill sites to minimise their impact on the environment has become scarce in recent years.

A Sweco spokesman spokesman said: ³In Sweden there is a strong focus on not using virgin soil or aggregates for landfill restoration. There are very few active landfill sites left. This is an old site that was closed, temporarily capped and has been left to settle over the past 15 years. Now the site needs to be permanently capped in accordance with the EU Landfill Directive.

³The Swedish economy is very strong and all our engineers are working flat out. I have worked with the Caulmert team previously in the UK, and know that they are efficient and professional. I knew they could do this work quicker and better for us.²

Jonathan an Associate Director with Caulmert said: ³We have successfully completed a number of international projects and it has been a pleasure to work with Sweco on this project. It is always interesting and challenging to gain an understanding of the site specific problems which need to be addressed and to come up with a practical solution which is appropriate for the relevant country.²

Senior Design Engineer, Elena said: ³Our designs have been developed to address the complex layout of the site and to provide a solution which minimises construction costs as well as minimising the impact on the environment in the long term.²

Founded in 2009, Caulmert is a privately-owned engineering, environmental and planning consultancy. It employs 45 in four offices around the UK, including eight members of its waste engineering and environmental services teams based at Eastwood Link Business Park, Nottingham.

Caulmert works on commercial, industrial, education, waste, renewable energy, residential, healthcare and infrastructure developments.

Household name clients include Airbus, Stoke City FC, BET365, TGI Fridays, Viridor, Tarmac and Pinewood Studios.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sam Harris .