| 63 Waste reduction and environmental protection during the construction and demolition process is an increasing focus for customers. And it’s something that Waikato Demolition has concentrated on for over a decade and was even the foundation the business was established upon, says company director Andrew Proudlock. “We saw an opportunity and believed that there would be a trend towards recycling in the demolition business and at the time nobody was o ering this service,” he says. This has led to the development of a multi-skilled business that today operates from the South Auckland region to New Plymouth. Founded in 2006 in Hamilton, Waikato Demolition is a sister company of AP Demolition. Both companies are operated under the umbrella of AP Group, which also includes AP Construction, AP Waste and Waingaro Quarries, leading to synergies between the di erent businesses. Waikato Demolition undertakes large or small, mechanical or manual demolition from garages to multi-storied commercial buildings. Any products that can be recycled are then taken to the company’s recycling facility including aluminium frames and timber. The facility also accepts loads of concrete from outside businesses. Heavy investment has been made into the latest equipment and the company now boasts specialised equipment with a focus on recycling, including a high reach digger which can stretch from 26 metres to 18 metres in the air and a robotic digger, which enables remote operation making tricky demolition projects safer. Crushing and screening of a range of aggregate products is undertaken with the company’s fully computerised crushing and screening plant. Product is then sold as builders mix (numbers 1 and 2 grade) and drainage aggregate (gap 20/40, 40/65 & 60+ grades). Sometimes product can be crushed on site with the company’s mobile crushing plant then used as back ll on the same project. It’s no surprise then that Waikato Demolition is capable of achieving some pretty impressive recycling statistics on some projects of up to 93%. This also means cost savings for clients with demolition project prices based on how many materials can successfully be recovered and on-sold. Of course as the items are also not going into land lls it is a win for the environment. Other services include timber recovery which sees Waikato Demolition recover timber from its demolition contracts for on-sale and re-use in its building projects. Waikato Demolition has recently completed a large project at the Soundshell in Rotorua, removing and disposing of friable asbestos safely as well as demolishing the structure paving the way for plans to redevelop the area into a world-class lakefront. “This project involved a lot of technical issues but by working alongside the other project partners and Rotorua Lakes Council we all worked together to nd solutions.” Andrew says that despite the challenging economic environment the company has been incredibly busy. “People are de nitely committing to push ahead with projects.” Leading the way in recycling
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