Jim Matthews, managing director of HG Matthews – the environmentally-focused brickmaker and sponsor of the RAI’s Active Discussions hub – talks to AT about the challenges and opportunities facing the construction industry as it shifts towards more sustainable and regenerative practices, and the role of leadership, innovation and collaboration in driving meaningful change.

Based in Bellingdon, Buckinghamshire, HG Matthews is a family-run brickworks with a strong environmental ethos. The company fires bricks using locally-sourced biomass instead of fossil fuels, harvests rainwater for reuse, and restores former clay pits as woodland or ponds to boost biodiversity. It also produces STROCKS, low-carbon, earth and chopped-straw blocks that repurpose excavated subsoil from building sites to reduce waste. Among the company’s latest initiatives is trialling fast-growing trees as a renewable fuel source.

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