05 July 2010
Environmental sustainability is a key aspect of our programme activities, and we also have plans to improve the environmental performance of our operational activities. The Greening Government Commitments, published in February 2011, set out an action plan for sustainable operations and procurement across Government. These commitments include targets for tackling carbon emissions, recycling waste, and reducing water and energy consumption in all UK government buildings.
DFID is committed to the targets and has made good progress in reducing our carbon emissions and in increasing our energy efficiency. We have a Carbon Management Plan setting out a five year strategy for meeting the Greening Government targets. Our Sustainable Operations Board oversees our progress towards the targets, and a Green Team of volunteers promote best practice and awareness with our staff. Since the baseline year DFID has made good progress in reducing our carbon emissions and in increasing our energy efficiency.
Overall, DFID has achieved a 35% reduction in carbon emissions from energy usage and travel during 2011/2012 compared to the 2009/2010 baseline.
We have improved the management of plant operation times (e.g reducing heating and cooling hours to match more closely the times when staff are in the buildings), rationalised servers and printers, rationalised our estate and installed a green roof at our site in East Kilbride, Scotland.
Carbon Emissions from air miles have reduced by 12% compared to the 2009/2010 baseline making good progress towards the 2014/2015 target. We have achieved savings through increasing the use of Video conferencing facilities; encouraging staff to take the train and raising awareness of the impact of air travel on climate change through key events such as Climate Week. Since the baseline year we have also significantly reduced Ministerial mileage by reducing the number of Ministerial vehicles and increasing car sharing.
Waste has reduced by 25% against the 2009/2010 baseline. This is mainly due to new waste management systems helping to reduce general waste. We are using over 20% less paper compared to the baseline of 2009/10, due to the printer rationalisation and raising staff awareness.
DFID has reduced water usage by 13% during 2011/2012 against the baseline. The installation and upgrade of many water saving mechanisms such as waterless urinals and dual flush systems has resulted in significant savings over the last few years. This results in an average of 5.6m³ per FTE which is good practice.
DFID also continues to make good progress towards our transparency commitments.
Bookmark with:
What are Bookmarks?