Thames Water has been recognised for its commitment to sustainability by the influential Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark for Infrastructure (GRESB) survey.
The UK’s largest water and wastewater company improved on last year’s performance, finishing top globally in the ‘water resources’ category, and fourth globally for infrastructure across all the 160 businesses that took part.
The GRESB awards are a way of assessing the sustainability of infrastructure assets in terms of environmental, social and governance performance.
Sander Paul van Tongeren, Co-Founder and Managing Director at GRESB, said: “We are proud to recognise Thames Water as a 2017 Infrastructure Asset Sector Leader for their clear commitment to managing their sustainability performance.
“Ahead of peers, Thames Water performed strongly in environment, social and governance (ESG) management and policies as well as in implementation and measurement, indicating ESG is a focus across all areas of their operations."
One of the examples that has seen Thames Water achieve their highest ever ranking, is the work the company is doing to generate energy from sewage.
In 2016/17 the company generated a record 267GWh of electricity from sewage, enough to power 86,000 homes a year.
The business is also looking at innovative ways to produce energy closer to its sites and where this is not possible, the company has bought renewable electricity.
Last year Thames Water unveiled Europe’s largest floating solar panel array on its Queen Elizabeth II reservoir, which part powers Hampton water treatment works in south-west London.
As well as reporting on environmental commitments in their Annual Report and Financial statement, Thames Water also voluntarily publishes an annual Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability Report.
Thames Water’s climate change and sustainability strategy manager, Dr Keith Colquhoun, said:
“I’m delighted that our action to improve sustainability performance has been recognised in this way, alongside our determination to be transparent and accountable in our actions.
“Our activities as a business have a clear impact on our customers, stakeholders and our shared environment, so it’s vital that our day to day activities, along with our longer-term projects, are clearly communicated and well governed.”
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