John L. Dutton, Chief Executive & Managing Director Whitebridge Lane Stone Staffordshire ST15 8LQ

Tel: 01785 811600 Fax: 01785 286688 e-mail: info@staffs-environmental.co.uk

Staffordshire Environmental Fund is an independent company limited by guarantee that was set up in 1997 to manage grant schemes. It has operated under the Landfill Communities Fund in Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent. The Fund has also operated grant schemes for the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, the Regional Government Office and Staffordshire County Council. Currently it is managing a two-years free investigatory and advisory waste reduction consultation programme entitled Designing-out Waste in which West Midlands businesses can take part.

Up to the end of September 2006, in its operations the Fund had awarded grants totalling nearly £11m to 340 projects that had a total value of £77m.

The Fund enrolled as an Environmental Body under the Landfill Communities Fund in 1997. In 2005 it became only the second Environmental Body in the U.K. to gain Certified Status.

Under the Landfill Communities Fund the Government allows landfill site operators to contribute a percentage of the Landfill Tax they collect to Environmental Bodies to enable them to undertake projects that meet one or more of the Schemes objectives or to grant-aid other not-for-profit organisations that wish to do so.

Summaries of the Landfill Communities Fund objectives and the types of project not supported by the Fund are detailed in the Landfill Communities Fund Response Section. Also available in that Section are the Fund's Application Form and Guidance Notes.

From February 2006 until March 2008, the Fund will run the Designing-out Waste project in the West Midlands. The scheme is free to participating businesses having been funded by the Landfill Communities Fund, Defra's BREW fund and Advantage West Midlands.

The project provides up to seven days consultancy culminating in a report containing recommendations that could reduce landfill inputs, carbon emissions and the use of raw materials, increase the use of recyclable materials, and improve the efficient use of energy and water. New products and markets may be identified. Through reducing costs and improving profits it is likely that jobs could be saved and possibly created and information will be provided about producers' responsibilities for products' end-of-life disposal. Courtesy of Envirowise, free optional extras will include a day's Fast Track and/or Design Track consultancy.

The project will be carried out by the Fund and in liaison where necessary with other partner organisations such as Envirotrade, Envirowise, AWM, Defra and the Environment Agency amongst others.

Fuller details about this grant-funded project and other bodies with which liaison is being maintained can be obtained either from its website:

http://www.designing-outwaste.co.uk

or by actioning the appropriate part of the LCF Response Section.

INFORMATION ON RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS SUPPORTED BY THE FUND

ANNUAL REPORT 2006

LANDFILL COMMUNITIES FUND REGULATIONS AND THE FUND'S PARAMETERS

RESPONSE FORM