Two big steps towards a better carbon footprint
Our environment and sustainability team achieved two significant milestones in our carbon accounting journey by attaining both the Carbon Trust Standard and CEMARS Certification.
The Carbon Trust Standard was achieved after demonstrating that our carbon reduction strategy and carbon accounting processes have led to a proven reduction in the carbon footprint from electricity and fuel use of our regulated water business over the three-year period to 2008.
This analysis gives us a strong starting point for the forthcoming Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), which will come into place in 2010. The government established the CRC as part of its Climate Change Act to drive down greenhouse gas emissions from industries and public sector services that use more than 6,000 mega watt hours (MWh) of electricity.
Carbon accounting or calculating a company’s carbon footprint is an evolving field and it’s important to choose an accredited approach that helps us stay informed of the changes. Working with our supply chain, we teamed up with Achilles to encourage our suppliers to calculate their own footprint and in turn encourage sustainable production. To do this a robust and internationally accredited carbon footprint approach has been created in the form of CEMARS (Certified Emissions Measurement and Reduction Scheme). Our business went through a tough series of assessments and an external audit to demonstrate we meet the standards set out under the Greenhouse Gas Protocol and ISO 14064-1 (the international standard for greenhouse gas quantification and reporting).
We’ve now got accreditation for our whole UK operation and are starting on the journey to extend this to cover our international operations too.
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