One of the judges of a schools environmental awards scheme says it hopes the initiative can help educate children about the ‘green three Rs’.

The Green School Awards aim to celebrate school-led projects in fields including green travel, conservation, air quality, recycling, and health and wellbeing.

And Richard Langshaw, owner of green technology business and awards judging organisation Loop CR, suggested they could play an important role in encouraging young people to reduce, reuse and recycle.

Loop CR owner Richard Langshaw said: “Loop CR is a company that collects and reuses unwanted IT equipment – the idea being that we extend the life of equipment so that it doesn’t go into landfill.

“The reason we’re supporting the Green School Awards is to encourage children to look at whether they actually need the latest model of phone or whether they can make do for the next six months or so with the one they’ve currently got.”

Mr Langshaw added that he hoped this might get young people thinking “about the environment they live in so that ... they’re able to give a more informed opinion as to how to maintain it in the future”.

The awards are open to schools across the south-east, and the deadline for submitting nominations for the awards is December 1.

Nominated initiatives might include school gardens, recycling schemes, walking buses or air-monitoring projects.

Apart from Loop CR, the awards’ judges are East Kent Recycling, the Ethical Earth Company, Golding Vision, NCS Technology, SGS Energy, Streetspace, Medway Council and Ashford International Hotel, where the awards ceremony will take place in February.

Find out more about the awards at Greenschoolawards.co.uk, and watch a video in which Mr Langshaw talks about them here: