May Gurney have outlined ambitious plans to slash C02 emissions by 50% over the next three years as part of its commitment to meet the needs of a low-carbon economy and, ultimately, to be carbon neutral by 2014.
May Gurney said that combined with sensible approaches to fuel management, the most significant way that the company could meet its carbon emissions goal was to look at different ways of working, which meant changing behaviours.
Dr Tom Macagno, head of sustainability, said: “Some organisations choose to offset their carbon impact through planting trees. But this simplistic approach avoids the core issue. The real challenge is to change people’s behaviours because that delivers permanent and sustainable benefits. And that’s what we’re aiming to do.”
The carbon reduction programme touches almost every aspect of May Gurney’s operations across the UK – encouraging its people to lift share, use video conferencing, public transport and home-working; investing in cleaner technologies, like renewable fuels; using technology, like hand-held devices and tracker data to reduce journeys; and exploring an internal ‘carbon tax’.
Dr Macagno added: “To make carbon savings on this scale, there’s no silver bullet. Our goal is to support our behavioural change programme with a range of simple front-line initiatives that are easy for our staff to adopt which, when taken together, can make a very real difference to the way we work now and in the future.
“It’s also essential to involve our clients in our carbon reduction programme. After all, they have similar goals. Working together can deliver significant benefits to our organisations and to the communities where we work.
“For example, in Somerset where we deliver environmental services to 232,000 households, we’ve developed new ways of collecting household waste and recycling. Our team has achieved the highest recycling rates in the country.”
A cross-company SCORE (Sustainability by C02 Reductions in Emissions) Group, headed up by Ian Findlater, board director with responsibility for sustainability, will champion the C02 reduction initiative, starting with employees being encouraged to track and improve their personal carbon footprints.
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