Dr Lesley Henderson, who is the group Leader of Sustainable Plastics Research (SPlaSH) in the department of Social and Political Sciences, is a co-investigator on a newly funded project entitled "A systems analysis approach to reduce plastic waste in Indonesian societies (PISCES)", which is funded £3.5 million by the UKRI. On this project, Dr Henderson will work with an interdisciplinary team from Brunel, Plymouth, Leeds, Oxford Universities as well as universities and NGOs in Indonesia to address sources, pathways and fate of plastic waste in the Indonesian environment. The project will use modelling and systems analysis of socio-economic, behavioural and cultural factors associated with plastic use to inform the development of various interventions and will be assessing their social, environmental and economic benefits. More information could be retrieved from the UKRI webpage.
Dr Henderson is also a co-investigator on another newly funded project namely “Providing the 30% recycled content for food packaging (PFP): An integrated stakeholder approach to solving ‘hard to recycle’ plastic packaging”, which is funded a total of £454,074. As part of this project, Dr Henderson will be working with colleagues in Chemical Engineering at Brunel University London as well as industry and retailers whilst co-ordinating research involving citizens in the UK, Spain and Germany.
