This week is our 8th birthday, and we thought it would be a good time to remind ourselves of the eco-friendly aims we’ve been working towards since day one.
A healthy atmosphere
Hands-on Health is a place where you can breathe easily, knowing that we have your well-being in mind. We have used environmentally-friendly paints, varnishes, furnishings, fittings and supplies wherever possible.
We supply Pure Dartmoor Water for our patients, clients and visitors from a cooler in reception. Unlike many other bottled waters, Dartmoor Water is bottled at source, drawn from deep under Dartmoor, and the 19 litre bottles are returned, sterilised and re-used. We provide glasses from our kitchen for patients to use, and compostable paper cups for clients attending classes, although we encourage them to bring their own reusable bottles.
The massage oil we use is an organic 100% grapeseed oil, good for even the most sensitive skin. Our laundry products, cleaning products and soaps are eco-friendly, and most are in containers that are refilled rather than replaced. Our couch roll and other paper supplies are all FSC approved.
A smaller carbon footprint
Local suppliers and eco-friendly, sustainable or recycled products have been our first choice for everything from building work to cleaning materials.
The studio and clinic treatment rooms have bamboo flooring* and underfloor heating and we have installed energy-efficient lights and appliances, high levels of insulation in floors, walls and ceilings and windows that are double glazed with low-emissivity glass.
We purchase our gas and electricity from Good Energy, a company that provides renewable energy, harnessing sources like sunshine, wind, rain and biofuels. It owns solar and wind sites including Delabole Wind Farm in Cornwall and Woolbridge Solar Park in Dorset. It also offers carbon neutral green gas.
Much of our furniture, including the reception table and chairs, is recycled – rescued from landfill when its previous business owners replaced it.
We ensure that all the clinic information is available on our comprehensive website, so that fewer people need to take a paper flyer; we have always printed our flyers in very small quantities as we need them.
We recycle everything we can, including the small amount of office paper, card and plastic packaging we use. Our current landfill waste amounts to about one 30 litre bag per month, and we’re working on reducing that further.
We hope you feel welcome and comfortable in our clinic – getting it right for our clients, ourselves and our planet is incredibly important to us.
*Bamboo grows much faster than hardwood trees, so it’s more sustainable and environmentally friendly than wood.
