How to baseline your organisation for environmental impact

A baseline is a snapshot of your current environmental impacts taken over a 12 month period.   You need to cover:

1.    Waste
a.    how much does your bins service cost
b.    how much actual waste volume is removed – you might not be able to get this figure. If not, have  a look in     your bins and see if they’re always full when emptied & guesstimate from there.
c.    How many bins you have, what size they are and how many lifts per annum
d.    Estimate the composition of your waste – ie 25% paper, 40% plastics & wrap - etc

Check out the Envirowise site under waste minimisation.  If you are not office based, go to the “Sectors” section of the Envirowise website for info relevant to your business type. Alternatively you might prefer to use their publications wizard, tick everything that applies to you, and it will generate a bespoke waste management guidance pdf just for you.

2.    Raw materials
On the Envirowise website you’ll see that to measure waste effectively you need to think of it from the moment it arrives at your door as a raw resource. Look to your billing data from your main suppliers to get a feel for what this is, then work through its path through your business to work out how it’s being used, by whom, where the waste arises and if any of it is unnecessary.

3.    Water
This is unlikely to be a huge cost in the office element under your direct control, but if you have taps that blast out water or old loos with big flushes, you can halve your costs with gadgetry that costs pence per unit. The raw data is easy to get from your billing data – hopefully you’re metered.  Check out Envirowise water reduction ar

Non office based businesses can have significant water costs, the Sectors site of Envirowise and the publications wizard will help you identify realistic reductions.
 
A simple exercise if you do have a meter and you can view it, is to do a weekend & overnight check to see if you’re consuming water when the office is closed – this would indicate leaks or drips and can add up to a surprising amount of money per year - as well as being a sinful waste of course.

4.    Energy (gas & electric)
a.    Per annum costs, per building
b.    Kilowatt hours used (this is your true usage indicator, as costs fluctuate)

Gas data if you have it will cover your heating costs. Electricity data gathered will give your top line only, there’s additional work to do to find out what are the main consumption areas – IT? Air con? Lighting? Etc.

Check out information on the Carbon Trust website to help you start to figure out where your energy waste might be occurring.

You might like to buy some inexpensive gadgetry to help you:
−    Simple energy meter – clips to your fuse box – for example: http://www.theowl.com/ 
−    Plug-in energy monitor  - to check individual appliances – for example:
http://www.energymonitors-direct.co.uk/shop/Eco-Eye-Plug-in-Energy-Monitor.html
Please note – these products are illustrative only and not recommendations.

5.    Vehicle fuel & business travel (not a travel plan for staff coming into work, you can do that another time).
a.    Business vehicle mileage – ie staff movement within work functions.
b.    Air / train travel
c.    Logistics – at some point this will cross over into the subcontract delivery side, which I suggest you do measure at this stage but on a separate spreadsheet

If you want to take this a step further at this stage, compile an inventory of vehicles and ownership status. Include all vehicles used on business travel, whether owned by the company or the staff member.

Tips on gathering the data: 
-    Get help! Create your green champions team now and share the burden of this data collection and compilation.
-    Have your finance department on-board. Much of this data will be held by the finance team. Their time invested will be rewarded in overhead reduction as you progress through the resource efficiency programme – a business just starting out can shave 20% of its main utility bills.
-    Ask your suppliers – they should be willing & able to help you. If not, you need a new supplier!

If you’re feeling ambitious and you want to enhance your baseline, consider:

Carbon Footprint
Once you’ve pulled together the baseline you can measure your carbon footprint. Carbon Trust advice & tools are comprehensive and high quality – and best of all, they are free to use. See www.carbontrust.co.uk/solutions/CarbonFootprinting

Benchmark your Carbon Footprint against the industry here
Other Sources of help:

Envirowise helpline: 0800 505794
•    Waste, water and raw resources advice & info
•    Access to online technical support
•    Further online tools
Carbon Trust helpline: 0800 085 2005
•    Energy consumption
•    Energy Action Planning
•    Energy Reviews ( min £50k p/a energy spend)

So, you know what and where your environmental impacts are. It’s time to work out what you would like them to be, and what you’re going to do differently to achieve it.

For more information email sustainability@bsk-cic.co.uk

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