Environmental Policy
The senior management team at Redhouse Lane has adopted the following environmental policy with a view to obtaining ISO14001 Environmental Management System Standard.
Redhouse Lane is committed to minimising the impact of its activities on the environment, safeguarding the health and safety of its employees, and in the process help its customers do the same.
We strive to conduct our activities in an environmentally sustainable manner.
We continually identify environmental aspects and impacts arising from our daily activities and the services we offer and assess their significance.
Once identified we set objectives, targets and programmes for improving our performance and monitor any improvements against these. All targets and objectives are regularly reviewed, taking into account changing legal and other requirements.
We promote environmental awareness amongst our staff, freelancers and contractors and make sure they are fully trained and competent to carry out the task to the best of their ability.
The scope of this policy covers all aspects of our business and includes both our London and Glasgow offices
Overall we aim to:
- Reduce our carbon footprint and investigate offsetting the tonnes of carbon we can’t reduce
- Improve our recycling facilities and introduce more recycling initiatives, such as the recycling of all food waste
- Continue to source suppliers with good environmental policies and practices and ensure environmental criteria are taken into account when buying goods and services
- Share our environmental knowledge and best practises with our clients and aim to always include an environmental option
- Increase staff awareness of environmental issues and provide necessary resources and training for staff to achieve environmental goals.
Reducing our Carbon Footprint
We are committed to reducing our carbon footprint by 5% annually from a base figure of 4.8 CO2e tonnes/per employee in 2008.
Energy Management
Our objective is to cut our energy consumption by 10% by 2012.
We aim to do this by:
- Running our plant room on a timer so that office cooling and water heating is not running when there is no use for it
- Lowering the temperature setting by 1°C
- Switching lights off in rooms which benefit from natural daylight and/or are not constantly in use, for example meeting rooms and staff room
- Stringently ensuring that all electrical equipment is turned off when not in use
- Replacing old electronic equipment with newer, more energy efficient models
Managing Water Usage
We aim to do this by:
- Maintaining our current use of water, which is below the Environment Agency benchmark for good practice
- Ensuring all toilets have a dual flush system
- Installing a water butt in the courtyard to collect rain water for outdoor plants
Managing Travel & Transport
We aim to do this by:
- Using more environmentally friendly delivery methods, such as pushbikes for local deliveries and electric vans and scooters where practicable
- Researching available technology for online meetings (such as GoToMeeting.com) and video conferencing facilities
- Giving staff the means to calculate the carbon footprint of their journey to work and providing means to reduce this through schemes such as cycle to work
- Calculating the emissions for journeys made between offices or to client meetings and investigating the possibilities of off-setting these
- Offering clients the option to off-set emissions for film shoots
Recycling
We have taken the following steps to manage and reduce the amount of waste we send to landfill:
- We have removed all individual bins from desks and created recycle points throughout the building
- All of our obsolete electrical equipment is reconditioned and distributed to charities and schools in developing countries. Anything which can’t be recycled is disposed of according to WEEE regulations 2007
- All ink cartridges are returned to our suppliers to be recycled
- To reduce the amount of plastic we recycle we only use reusable glasses with our water coolers.
We aim to improve on this by:
- Increasing our recycling facilities to include glass, milk cartons and all food waste
- Educating staff on what can be recycled and encouraging them to think about what they’re disposing of
Supply Chain
We will continue to source suppliers with good environmental policies and practices and ensure environmental criteria are taken into account when buying goods and services.
We aim to do this by:
- Sourcing suppliers with green credentials and accreditations(example: Wiles, our stationers, are ISO 14001 accredited as well as being listed in the Sunday Times Green List 2009)
- Aiming to make a positive social and environmental impact through our purchasing (example: Aquaid, our water cooler provider, make a 40p donation on our behalf for every bottle of water we buy, to fund clean water projects in Africa)
- Creating a green suppliers questionnaire to assess the credentials of all new suppliers
- Using stock with a minimum 80% of recycled content (example: all publications use paper which is totally chlorine free and if budgets allow we specify water-soluble varnishes)
- Providing quotes from environmentally friendly printers
- Encouraging clients to use PDF formats as proofs rather than order hard copies
- Requesting that our cleaning company uses environmentally friendly products where possible
- Sourcing environmentally friendly and ethical catering supplies (example: all staff teas, coffee & sugar are bought from fair trade suppliers. For client events, we are researching organic catering companies who only use locally sourced seasonal produce)
Sharing Environmental Best Practice
We aim to do this by:
- Always offering a more environment-conscious option when providing quotes
- Offering smarter distribution methods that reduce waste
Communicating and involving staff
We consult with staff on environmental issues using the following channels:
- The staff council is consulted on all major environmental changes and issues and members are given the opportunity to input into policies and procedures
- News & Views, our weekly internal newsletter, has a section for ‘green’ news or local environmental events.
- We use the kitchen notice board to regularly communicate with staff about green issues as well as using it to get staff to give us ideas for new initiatives we can introduce.
Reviewing and Researching
We’re open to new ideas and initiatives so if you have any comments or feedback on our environmental policy or initiatives, or would like further information, please let us know – by email, rather than post!
Contact: Ian.samuels@redhouselane.com
