Professional & Compliant Public Sector Procurement

Education Procurement Sector Centre of Excellence

Best Green Procurement Project 2019 Awarded to EPS

The tenth annual National Procurement Awards ceremony took place on Thursday, November 14th, at the Ballsbridge Hotel, Dublin.

Philip Gurnett (EPS Director and Head of Sourcing), Ann Murray (EPS Category Specialist), Dr. Chris Fogarty (Energy Manager, University of Limerick) and David Mangan (EPS Portfolio Manager)

EPS were delighted to be the recipient of “Best Green Procurement Project of the Year”. This was a great win for EPS following on from our previous successes, ‘Best Procurement Team of the year’ which we won in 2016 and again in 2018 and ‘Best People Development Initiative’ in 2018.

Best Green Procurement Project is a significant and prestigious award for EPS to win, particularly as the project was completed in partnership with UL and focused on the “reduction of single use plastic on campus”. The project aligns UL Buildings and Estates and EPS in achieving the objectives set by the UL President, the Department of Education and Skills and government policy on the environment.

Speaking about the initiative Dr Chris Fogarty, UL’s Energy Manager, said: “I had the pleasure of working with the EPS to deliver a high-impact project focussed on dramatically reducing single-use plastics at UL. Working with the EPS to ensure the appropriate specifications were included as part of the procurement has facilitated the ongoing effectiveness of the project to be quantified. The EPS approach to the procurement process was collaborative throughout and underpinned by an easy to follow roadmap. The EPS were professional, courteous and efficient and I look forward to working with them in the future.”

Who We Are

The Education Procurement Service (EPS) is the Department of Education & Skills (DES) sector sourcing hub and operates as a shared service for the DES, its agencies, the schools sector, Education and Training Boards and the Higher Education Sector.

EPS is one of the four sector specific procurement functions comprising Education, Health, Defence and Local Government. They operate together with the Office of Government Procurement (OGP) under the national procurement model as part of the Government’s Public Service Reform agenda.