Here at 3Keel, the biggest impact we can have by far is by working with our partners and clients to drive ambitious and transformational changes, and we’re working non-stop to keep this going amidst a tumultuous start to the year. Having said that, we believe that real change does start at home and that to be credible sustainability experts it is important for us to lead by example and practice what we preach. What this means is that we’re taking serious action to reduce our own footprint and consider our social and environmental impacts as a business. We’ve published our latest sustainability report here, and you can see some of the highlights below.
Our carbon footprint
Our Energy
The claim of zero-carbon energy is one that’s being made increasingly often, but unfortunately one that’s also being watered down. There are all sorts of ways to claim that your energy is ‘fully renewable’, but as explained in this article, some green tariffs are ‘greener’ than others. To make sure our energy really is renewable, we’ve built a 9.7 kWp array of solar panels on our office’s own roof. The panels provide our offices with energy all year round, and from early spring to late autumn they provide enough for us to actually be significant exporters of energy back to the grid!
Of course there are times when the sun isn’t shining, and to meet our residual needs we use Ecotricity – they build and source 100% renewable energy directly from their own wind and solar farms.
We also try to minimise our consumption where possible – we’ve installed efficient LED lighting everywhere in the office, upgraded our electric heating system (the new ‘smart’ system saves us over 20% in the winter months!), and require a full energy efficiency rating and lifecycle costing for any new electrical purchases.
Our Waste
As a consulting business we don’t produce much waste, but we still want to take all the right steps. We prioritise reducing consumption impacts – for example we’re an essentially paperless business (we only print if our clients really need it, and our printer ink is refillable – so no cartridges!) and our milk comes in reusable glass bottles. We also have a food waste collection and recycling scheme which we offer for free to other businesses in our business park, and if we ever have any food scraps they’re sent to feed Holly Cooper‘s rescue chickens!
Our Travel
As the challenges we face span more than just Oxfordshire, we do sometimes need to travel. We use video-conferencing and try to walk, cycle and take public transport as much as possible, however there are some rare occasions where we need to drive or fly.
For these occasions we’ve recently installed two EV chargers at our office (not in the report as we’ve only just built these!) and subsidise EVs for our employees, while for flights we always travel economy and invest in responsible offsets.
Everything Else
As sustainability specialists we try to make sure sustainability is engrained in all of our decisions, and that the little things count too. This means things like buying our loo roll from Who Gives A Crap?, catering meetings with vegetarian/vegan meals, buying refurbished or second-hand equipment where possible, supporting flexible working for staff to minimise unnecessary travel, and much more!
Sharing our ideas
Above all, we think it’s so important just to talk to our neighbours and share any ideas we have. As an example, we shared the experience and business case for installing solar panels on our roof with our neighbours – two businesses in our business park have since installed solar panels. We provided them with guidance on securing planning permission, provided templates we had used ourselves, and assisted with calculating the business case for installation. As of January 2020, our business park is now able to generate over 40 kWp electricity from the sun!
Still Interested?
If you’d like to really get into the details, head on over to our full sustainability report here. We’re always open to discuss and share any ideas that we have – and of course if there’s anything else you think we’ve missed, we’re all ears…
