Making a Positive Change – Staverton Is Carbon Neutral for Energy
We must all do as much as possible to reduce our impact on the natural world and it’s why at Staverton we’ve been working hard to build greater sustainability into our operations.
Reducing the carbon footprint of our business is one way to make a positive change and it’s something we’re proud to say we’ve achieved over the last six months.
Carbon Offsetting Projects
Our energy footprint of 106 tonnes of carbon per year relates to our two sites: Rotherham (our office furniture manufacturing facility) and London (our showroom) and we’ve offset last year’s emissions via two fantastic projects.
The first is with a renewable energy project in India – called Kothapeta. We’ve offset our emissions by funding an equivalent reduction of carbon emissions at this grid-connected natural gas-based Combined Cycle Power Plant. The project has the capacity to meet the base-load requirements of India’s southern grid. It uses cleaner fuels to generate electricity rather than high-carbon emitting fossil fuels such as coal.
The second is supporting Tom’s Wood in Yorkshire, the county where our office furniture manufacturing facility is based. This project, which has been established to understand the guidance of the Woodland Carbon Code and the Peatland Code, spans more than 18 hectares, and is focused on creating new native woodland to promote local biodiversity and wildlife connectivity. Already the wood includes 52,700 trees and will sequester more than 14,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide during its growing lifetime. Staverton is pleased to have added 100 more trees to the woodland, which will offset 36 tonnes of our carbon emissions.
How We Got There
This project has been delivered with the help of consultants from Environmental Strategies Ltd – who measured the extent of Scope 1 (direct greenhouse emissions that occur from sources controlled or owned by an organisation) and Scope 2 (emissions caused indirectly when the energy it purchases and uses is produced) carbon emissions, before identifying reduction strategies and putting off-setting plans in place.
Continual Progress
This focus on carbon reduction isn’t our only environmentally-minded endeavour – we’re also working hard to reduce waste and the emissions we produce in the first place. Plus we have already made a variety of operational and design changes to ensure that sustainability is part of who we are. From sharing components between designs to cut down on manufacturing, right through to building longevity and flexibility into our office furniture, removing packaging from our products and filling our delivery vans more carefully to reduce mileage and carbon – we are making positive changes. Over the last year we’ve also recycled 98.5% of our waste and we’re on track to hit 99% this year. Sustainability is part of who we are, and we ask it of our supply chain too.
As a UK office furniture designer and manufacturer we know that true sustainability isn’t a one-off task. It has to underpin the very essence of how we approach the design, manufacture, install and afterlife of office furniture as well as our individual behaviours, each and every day. We are committed to the task …after all, we have to be the environmental change we want to see.
To find out more about our progress and commitment to sustainable office furniture design and manufacture – visit https://staverton.co.uk/sustainable-office-furniture-supplier/