Open for debate...

Alison has been reading again. This time it's government policy, a thing we should all keep our eyes on. Here is her response:

So the Communities and Local Government Department have recently issued a Draft National Planning Policy Framework. They state that it is a “key part of our reforms to make the planning system less complex and more accessible, and to promote sustainable growth”. All good so far.

There definitely seems room for improvement in the planning system and the ability of it to react to a changing economic, social and environmental landscape.

We use the existing Planning Policy Guidance and Statements (PPG/PPS) considerably as part of our work. For example, we carry out Environmental Impact Assessments of large scale developments and renewable developments (e.g. onshore wind), and the PPGs/PPSs provide information on the requirements that the developments have to meet in order to be agreed. Further to this we do a lot of work with clients at the pre-planning stage, such as carrying out ecological and contaminated land surveys and putting together sustainability statements.

So any updates and changes to policy seem important to keep up with the times. However, although this is only a draft framework, some concerns are already being raised. The report starts off by clearly defining sustainable development to include the economic, social and environmental impacts on society. But it quickly moves on to start talking solely about ‘sustainable economic growth’. It also states “There is no necessary contradiction between increased levels of development and protecting and enhancing the environment, as long as development is planned and undertaken responsibly.” Some critics have highlighted the final part of this sentence to be the most worrying. They feel, that the problem is that it is often NOT undertaken responsibly.

Whilst we are remaining neutral on our judgment a quick search of the 65 page report highlights that the words ‘climate change’ and ‘natural environment’ only appear 7 times each in the main text. It will be interesting to see how influential this document will be to the planning system once it has been through consultation. I think the consultation responses will make good reading over a glass of red wine….

The irony of improved building fabric performance

Alison contributes the following (I am always too hot in the new office):

As Yvonne recently mentioned, we have just moved offices. The move has been interesting and has involved all kinds of changes in office behavior, commuting principles and how we interact we each other.

However, most obvious to me (as someone who is always a bit cold) is the change in temperature. I now no longer have to spend 10 months of the year in my ECUS fleece as our new office is well insulated and generally not drafty (unlike our very leaky and old-fashioned Victorian office building we moved from). This is a GOOD thing in general for people at ECUS like me who are always a bit cold! Others who are more warm-blooded are not necessarily so pleased.

However, today, for the first time in my ECUS career, I am too hot. The windows are open, but it is a wind-less day and the air conditioning unit is not working. I can only assume that it has something to do with good building insulation, 14 people in the office and lots of electrical equipment giving out heat as it is not sunny or particularly hot outside.

I am therefore left pondering the ironies of improved building fabric – fantastic in principle, but potentially an issue if we don’t have the right heating, cooling and ventilation facilities in place. And how will climate change affect this? The fact the air-con is not working is good for the environment, but not good for employee satisfaction and contentment…yet another sustainability dilemma!

George...don't do that!

It wasn't just Alison out and about recently - we all went to this event but Alison wrote it up:

Leaving work on time and a glass of wine always heralds a good start to an evening. And this one was no exception. The environmental management team minus Catherine :( but plus our most faithful groupie (Sally, Yvonne's daughter) trooped off to see one of our heros in action the other night at the Showcase.

George Monbiot was in town for one night only. I wasn't sure what to expect. We frequently read his blog and almost got him to agree to meet us for lunch at our last Away Day, but aside from knowing he is an excellent scribe with very well-formed personal views on a progressive society, we didn't know much else.

The format worked well - George opened the event with a 10 minute speech presenting an opinion on the changes to the NHS. And then he opened up the discussion to the floor. It was well attended with young and old there in equal numbers. He has done these events a lot in the past few years and took care to allow equal comments from men and women. Whilst I expect he was preaching to the converted in many cases, it was also a great opportunity to challenge our own opinions by listening to comments from a wide range of people in the audience. There were chatterboxes, quietly considered opinions, rambling comments, rants, left wingers, right wingers and bang in the middle wingers and swearers. We talked about the economy, society, the power of individuals, climate change, fossil fuels, supply and demand models and prostitution.

But the one thing I took away from it is the huge variety of opinions that are out there and the correspondingly huge privilege we have in terms of being allowed to express our opinions in public in this country. I agreed with some and I completely disagreed with others. But that didn't reduce the respect I had for anyone in the room. They are all entitled to their opinions. It would be great if we could find a way to get more and more people from all walks of life interested in sharing their views in this way.

So George....please keep doing that!

A 'lean' approach to sustainabilty

Alison has been out and about again. Here she reports on an interesting topic:

I can honestly say that I never stop learning in my job. That is a privilege but also hard work sometimes! It means you constantly have to review how you think, what you are doing and how you are advising your clients.

Working with the manufacturing sector has taught me a lot about efficiency and waste, and not just tangible efficiency and waste. Time, use of raw materials, distance travelled, stock management, communication between the office and the shop floor; all of these elements of manufacturing have the potential to create tangible waste and intangible inefficiencies in the system.

However, when I look at that list of potential wastes I immediately think about sustainability as opposed to lean manufacturing. It is clear that the two are inextricably linked. Generally speaking, efficient processes, efficient use of raw materials, reducing miles travelled and improving communication are tools that we use in our jobs to discuss the environmental element of sustainability with clients.

Sustainability is about the environmental AND social impacts of the economic activities that we carry out. So we can’t forget the social side of this too. It may be that more efficient or ‘leaner’ processes in manufacturing leads to loss of jobs as processes become streamlined or automated. That is a challenge for society as a whole – if you ask a manufacturer what their primary aim is it will probably be something like ‘creating value’ not ‘creating jobs’.

On Tuesday I was at an excellent event on ‘Lean Office’ organised by the very practical and supportive Manufacturing Advisory Service. Despite the potential challenges of having ‘lean’ organisations on society, it is a tool that can be effectively linked to sustainability. Carrying out value stream or process mapping of any organisation’s processes can highlight areas of waste within the system that may be able to be managed out. Reducing physical waste has an immediate cost benefit to the company and will help you conform to the new legal requirements of adhering to the waste hierarchy (reduce, reuse, recycle).

We need to start taking a broader approach to all these tools and concepts available to organisations – sustainability effectively challenges us to see the bigger picture and look at things as a whole, without forgetting people and the environment. Taking a ‘lean’ approach can be an excellent starting point.

Alison Fanshawe

News from the manufacturing sector

Alison recently attended an event run by the Manufacturing Advisory Service in Yorkshire which contained an update on the government's thoughts on supporting this sector.

- The government have decided to support high growth manufacturing businesses (i.e. +20% growth for more than 3 years!) – this only represents about 6% of all manufacturing companies or 1500 across the UK. They will identify and support them through a Business Coaching for Growth Support Service. MAS will remain but at a lower level, probably at a regional level but the jury is still out on how the service will work. Business Link will no longer be supported

- One CEO of a manufacturing company is sitting on the board of the new Sheffield City Region local enterprise partnership (LEP) which covers Sheffield, Chesterfield, Barnsley, Rotherham, Doncaster, Bassetlaw & North East Derbyshire. These are NOT replacements for regional development agencies (RDAs like Yorkshire Forward) and no-one is quite sure how they will work or what their remit will end up being. The good news is, they are totally industry-driven to give support to business in the region from other businesses in the region. No more quangos or middle-men. There is only approximately £10m funding available for the next three years for each LEP and the first round of bids obviously shows massive over-subscribing. But each LEP is free to pick what will best fit the region. Key aims for our LEP: advanced manufacturing, employer-led skills and support, finance (i.e. access to finance for SMEs) and a digital hub.

- Skills – SEMTA is the Learning Skills Council for manufacturing. There was interesting information on skills gap (at skills level 2 + 3) – primarily lies in the 25-40 age range (i.e. the managers of the future). This is a big problem that needs sorting.

- The Leadership Solar System (by Bill McGrawley) – 4 planets, which I thought fed nicely into ECUS' Environmental Management vision and values. This states that you need the four qualities below to lead.

1. High morality

2. Optimal product portfolio

3. Unleash people

4. Understand strategic landscape.

In addition you need prudence, the ability to listen, decisiveness, honesty, communication, no greed, don’t exploit, diversity (skills) and a measured response to challenges.

Refurbishing our tired & leaky old houses

A new post from Alison:

Yvonne and I went on a very interesting training course at the Building Research Establishment (BRE) the other day on Sustainable Refurbishment. It really made us think not just about the implications on the clients that we work with (particularly those that do refurbishment of social housing), but also about the refurbishment of our own houses.

We both live in houses that are at least 100 years old and as such they are pretty energy inefficient however tight we both are with the use of our heating! They are basically like sieves in terms of the heat and carbon emissions that leak from them! There were 3 main things that I took away with me from the course that we thought may be useful to share:

1. the Building Regulations apply to ALL properties undergoing refurbishment - the implications of this are potentially huge, although it became apparent that local authority building control teams do not always have the resources and understanding to police this. That is a real shame - the regulations are changing again next month and the requirements for energy efficiency (i.e. air tightness and use of A-rated equipment) are increasing - it is only through encouragement (e.g. grants and incentives) and policing that we can actually help implement the new requirements which will ultimately reduce real carbon emissions from the significant older housing stock we have in the UK

2. it costs money - refurbishing housing to meet Decent Homes standards costs money. Refurbishing them to Decent Homes standard + getting them to a point where they are energy efficient costs lots more.

3. but the technology is readily available to help improve the energy efficiency of older homes. What is missing are the skills and information to use and know about the new technology. Aerogel, external and internal insulation, photovoltaic panels, phase-changing materials....the list goes on. The new technology is really exciting. But we do not yet have a construction industry that has the knowledge and skills to implement it. This will of course change over time.

Maybe this is a classic case of demand and supply. Until the demand for new technologies is there on a large scale then the supply of them will remain expensive. It may be that the private sector moves quickly on this itself, or it may require Government intervention to help things happen more quickly. Either way it's exciting (if not challenging) times ahead.

Alison goes for a little stroll...

Sometimes the people of ECUS stop working and do something for charity! This time it was my turn. The three peak challenge - up and down Ben Nevis in Scotland, Scafell in Cumbria and Snowden in Wales in 24 hours.

Most of us at ECUS love the outdoors and I will happily spend hours outdoors in my free time - but usually it's for fun! My husband and I have walked Snowden and Scafell on separate occasions, but this time it was much tougher - we always thought Snowden was not that tricky but after no sleep for 36 hours and two other mountains it proved equally as challenging. The beer and snickers at the top in the sunset was well worth the wait. However I would recommend the challenge to anyone - the sense of achievement is immense and my body is aching but my mind is content this morning!

The hardest part is travelling between all three mountains in the time allocated and staying awake enough to get up when you arrive at the next mountain and put your walking boots back on blistered and tired feet!

So thanks to everyone who sponsored me - you helped to raise about £300 for the Bluebell Wood Children's Hospice (http://www.bluebellwood.org/) which I know will be greatly appreciated.

Thoughts from a motorway service station

Some interesting thoughts from Alison:

It was a hot and sticky August day and the threat of rain was in the air. We pulled off the M40 on the way back from another carbon-intensive wedding in London to fill up our (reasonably fuel efficient) car. My husband dealt with the fuel payment (can it really cost £70 to fill up a 1.9 litre engine car these days?!) and I walked back to the actual services to buy some lunch.

The services resembled a cross between Alton Towers during the holidays and that old favourite TV programme ‘Supermarket Sweep’. There was a hideous queue for the ladies, every seat (inside and outside) was taken with families on their way to or on their way back from holiday destinations and people were literally throwing themselves on food wherever they could grab it from.

But quite aside from the enochlophobia that suddenly came over me I was completely overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of consumption that was going on in those 50 metres squared. Cappucinos, fast food, packaged sandwiches, sweets, crisps, fruit (not much), canned drinks. I stopped and looked around me and could not see one single person without their mouths open stuffing food and drink into it.

I freely admit that on this occasion I joined them. I usually try and make our own lunch/dinner in the car, not because I’m an eco-warrior, but because I refuse to dish out for the extortionate prices they charge you at the service stations (talk about a closed market). I paid £10 for two lots of sandwiches and two bags of crisps – ouch.

If this much consumption of food and drink and this much waste was being generated at this one small service station off the M40 at that precise moment in time (which probably accounted for 0.00001% of the UK’s population), how much was being consumed and wasted around the world at that moment? A scary thought.

So what can we do? Make our own sandwiches? Well yes, but that may not be the long-term, universal solution of choice. Somehow we have to wake people up to the reality of having a finite amount of space and resources on this earth. Organisations and the culture therein can play a big part in this – what type of culture do you advocate at your organization? Do you have a Green Travel Plan but your Directors still turn up to work in their 3 litre engine sports cars? Do you order in food for meetings from local companies but then always thrown half of it away?

We have to learn to complete the sentences which we are beginning to start. “We have a Green Travel Plan…..and everyone in our company from the top to the bottom is committed to trying to uphold the plan and reduce carbon emissions”. “We order food locally…….and have implemented a system to ensure that we do not over-order and that leftovers are distributed to staff”.

We are still thinking one dimensionally about resource efficiency and consumption – it is time we stopped leaving things unsaid.

Low Carbon & Construction - Top Ten Thoughts from Alison

How are the construction industry going to embrace the challenge of the Government’s plan to work towards a low carbon economy in the UK? That is a question that has been considered in the recent report issued by the Construction Innovation & Growth Team working group. It’s a really interesting report, and I thought it would be useful to paraphrase a few of the key facts, findings and recommendations that have come out of it. Alternatively you can access the report here.

1. The UK is committed by law to reduce carbon emissions (Climate Change Act) and due to the significant emissions from built infrastructure, the construction industry have a big part to play in working towards the carbon reduction targets
2. The Government’s ‘Low Carbon Transition Plan’ should be seen as a business plan for construction over the next 40 years
3. Whilst the construction industry has a lot to think about at the moment, the focus on carbon provides a simple and rigorous focus for action
4. For companies in the construction supply chain, their task is threefold:

• De-carbonise your own business

• Build energy efficient buildings

• Provide infrastructure for a low carbon economy.

5. To do this, each part of the construction supply chain (client, designer, buyer/surveyors, site team, final user) needs to understand and accept their responsibilities for creating a low carbon economy
6. To achieve this, we need skilled and enthusiastic people in the industry
7. Currently, there is no accurate understanding of the scale of change required to meet these challenges
8. Carbon presents 4 key opportunities for the construction industry:

• Lots of work – newbuild and refurbs to meet stricter carbon requirements

• Reform the structure and practice of the industry

• Export products, knowledge and skills

• Enthuse future generations to work in a forward-thinking and exciting industry

9. There are barriers that may hinder progress, including:

• Over-regulation and confusing support from Government

• Silo-ism and lack of collaboration and communication in the supply chain

• Up-skilling

• The gap between design and implementation in practice of low carbon buildings

• Focus on initial costs versus lifetime value

• Lack of drivers for change in customer demand, which leads to inertia on the supply side

10. The report has just ONE key recommendation to Government: employ a competent person to make sure we can actually implement the UK’s Low Carbon Action Plan in the construction sector.

Alison on sustainability

If I could have a 'Frequently Asked Questions' list from having been in this job for 15 months, it would include the following:

- What does 'being sustainable' really mean?

- Why do Councils in the UK all collect different materials for recycling and why are the bins different colours?

- Is it more sustainable to use a hand-dryer or paper towels when drying your hands?

- If I got rid of my car and just used taxis and public transport would that a) be cheaper? b) be kinder to the environment?

- How do you get people to change their behaviour and switch off lights/equipment?

- Why am I being held back from making our company more sustainable by the grey-haired people in our boardroom who won't be around to worry about it in 20 years?

- Diesel or petrol engines?

- When does a waste stop being a waste?

- If something has a value is it still deemed to be waste if I'm throwing it away?

- Is Climate Change really happening?

And have I answered those questions? Well, in some cases the answers are a little more black and white, and in others the truth is I simply don't know. All I do know, is that we are still making our minds up about which activities in our lives ARE sustainable and those which are not.

I think being sustainable is 1/3 common sense, 1/3 having accurate baseline information from which we can clearly assess the issue and take informed decisions, and 1/3 hindsight. Which means 66.6% of it is something we can act upon now, and the remaining 33.3% we will learn with time. I guess the aim is to reduce the element of hindsight over time and hope that we act quickly enough to prevent long term damage to our planet.