What is our carbon footprint?
Carbon Creative has a total, calculated carbon footprint of 8.6 metric tons per year
What measures do we use to offset this:
To accurately measure our environmental footprint we focus primarily on the direct impacts of our office based operations but we also include measurable indirect impacts of such as business and employee travel.
We calculate our carbon footprint each year from the start of February year one to the start of February year two. We use source calculation information provided by The Carbon Trust and Defra and they are based on our single site at 25 Waters Edge Business Park, Modwen Road, Salford
We identified power as one of our main sources of CO2 emissions: we have addressed this at source by purchasing 100% renewable energy. This is supplied by EcoTricity and fed directly into the National Grid, where we effectively draw it off. 100% renewable energy means that all the power is generated either by wind turbines, hydroelectric, geothermal or solar. In effect, our power is carbon neutral at source.
We use natural gas for heating our building. Gas is a fossil fuel but is quite efficient and burns fairly cleanly. That said, in using it, we output CO2 so, to counter this, we are using carbon offsetting. This is purchased directly from our provider Gazprom.
Business and employee travel are another main source of CO2 emissions and, whilst we provide incentives to staff and strategies to reduce the amount of travel based on fossil fuels, ultimately we have to rely on company transport for client meetings, deliveries and incidental travel.
Currently we tackle this using carbon offsetting. We calculate our carbon output and use an accredited carbon-offsetting company to purchase offsets credits with which to neutralise CO2 generated by travel.
Some emissions are unquantified at present. These include indirect emissions from our supply chain and are notoriously difficult to calculate. For instance, if we supply printed brochures to a client this would be achieved through one of our rostered trade print suppliers.
The print supplier would order paper from a paper merchant distributor, the printing plates and inks from a printing supplies distributor. The distributors will have their own supply chain of manufacturers and so the chain continues until you reach the point of the raw materials, in this case such as wood/pulp (for paper), metals (for printing plates), minerals (for inks), plastics (for binding and packaging) and fossil fuels for carriage of items.
Once a print supplier has received the materials, the manufacturing processes of the brochure would then require power for running plate making equipment, printing presses and print finishing. Final delivery of the project would likely use road or rail transport. All these processes cascade, generating varying degrees of carbon dioxide and are metrics that are not easily or practically obtainable when cascading down a complex supply chain.
However we are keen to address this issue and the only real way forward is to use suppliers that calculate their own carbon footprint and neutralise it. This would require each supplier in the chain to enforce carbon management on their suppliers. However, it costs to do this, and sadly, competitive market forces prevent this from happening at present. Until governments impose tax breaks on carbon neutral companies, then they will remain marginalised.
Our tree planting campaign has so far resulted in 3,700 trees being planted in our local area of Salford. Trees are purchased as saplings, 1m in height, which have been grown from seedlings at a local nursery four miles from our offices in Salford.
We purchase and plant a mixed variety of trees for reasons of biodiversity and locations that best match the species. Most trees are planted in managed woodlands, schools, parks and green spaces around Salford. Trees sequester (absorb) carbon dioxide as they grow and as part of photosynthesis. A fully grown tree depending on size, conditions and species will sequester 15-30kg of CO2 per year.
The majority of our trees are still young and, based on their mass, will sequester an estimate 3-5kg of CO2 each per year. Based on this calculation 3,700 trees will sequester between 11.1-18.5 metric tons of CO2 per year. By offsetting our carbon footprint using other methods, the tree-planting activities we undertake actually ensures we stay carbon positive, removing more carbon than we output.
We are in the final stages of ISO14001 accreditation, which is an international standard for environmental management. It is a time-consuming process to undertake for a company of our size but we are nearly there.
However it should be noted that ISO14001 does not make you a green company. All nuclear power stations in the UK are ISO accredited and most people wouldn’t deem a nuclear power station to be green. ISO14001 provides accreditation to state that you are measuring and monitoring your environmental impact with a target for reduction. It is the most widely adopted standard for environment management in Europe and therefore carries the most commercial credibility.
We are pleased that Carbon Trust now have their own form of accreditation which we believe appropriate for our company and we are eagerly pursuing this. Currently no other design agency in the UK has been awarded this mark.
To see a complete list of what we offer visit our design agency manchester services section. If you wish to have a chat
call 0161 877 3500.
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