A year on from COP26

Last year, we committed to the Science Based Targets Initiative and pledged to set emission reduction targets in line with a 1.5°c warming scenario. Following on from this strengthening of our ambition and alignment to the gold standard of climate pledges, we have undertaken the following:

Net Zero Carbon strategy

• Appointed Simon Leek as Company Carbon Manager to oversee our carbon reduction programmes and engage and support our project teams, supply chain and clients to deliver low carbon solutions.
  
  
• Completed a detailed footprinting exercise, hotspot analysis and emission reduction scenarios for Scopes 1, 2 & 3.
  
  
• Reviewed our data capture and reporting systems to increase the efficiency and accuracy of our data.
  
  
• Developed and submitted our carbon reduction targets to the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) for verification.
  
  
• Developed our carbon principles to guide us to deliver our carbon reduction programme.
  
  

Carbon reduction initiatives

We cannot credibly achieve net zero without first focusing our efforts on reducing our carbon emissions as much as possible. We have undertaken the following initiatives to reduce both our direct and indirect emissions:

• Increased our supply of electricity from renewable sources to 90%, with an ambition to reach 100%.
  
  
• Established a framework agreement to supply hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO) fuel to our sites to reduce our diesel consumption. The rollout this year has represented a 36% saving on our total scope 1 emissions against our baseline year.
  
  
• Transitioned over 50% of our vehicle fleet to run on HVO rather than diesel, with plans developed to increase this to 100% in line with our plant improvement programme.
  
  
• Trials of plant efficiency measures such as flywheels, batteries and hybrid generators.
  
  
• Launched initiatives to help our employees transition to electric vehicles.
  
  
• Ongoing trials of low carbon materials and products on our projects.
  
  
• Developed and rolled out our mandatory carbon literacy programme for our staff.
  
  
• Developed and rolled out our embodied carbon process to undertake embodied carbon assessments and build our as-built embodied carbon dataset.
  
  
• Continuing our support to industry wide initiatives which progress the understanding and uptake of decarbonisation measures and standards in the UK. For example, committing our support to Part Z, an industry proposed amendment to the building regulations 2010 to regulate embodied carbon and providing our insight to the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee enquiry and Building to net zero: costing carbon in construction.
  
  
• Continuing to invest in our knowledge, skills and expertise to help identify risks and opportunities to reduce carbon emissions and deliver NZC assets for our clients.

“We’ve made good progress this year in implementing our decarbonisation plan and strengthening our response to the climate emergency. However, we recognise that we alone do not have all the answers and cannot achieve our ambitions in isolation, it requires true collaboration. We will therefore continue to support industry wide initiatives to standardise the approach to Net Zero Carbon, and work with our people, clients and supply chain to reduce carbon emissions and deliver NZC assets”

Simon Leek Company Carbon Manager