Environmental Report 2011

After many hours spent chasing invoices, looking at spreadsheets and working out emission factors we've finally published our Environmental Report for 2011. I don't know (yet) how to add a document to this blog, so if you'd like a copy sent to you please email me at audrey@castle-climbing.co.uk and I'll be happy to send you a copy. It's important to me that this information is available so that other businesses can learm from our experiences and help reduce their own carbon footprint.

  If you just want a quick summary of the key facts, read on:

- Carbon Footprint for 2011 : 100.17 tonnes CO2e (14.5% reduction from 2010, 27% reduction from when we started reporting in 2008)
- Cafe : we opened our own kitchen to process food grown in our organic garden. In 2011 we were just starting to transition from purchased food to homemade- this is nearing completion in 2012.
- Shop : we continue to increase our range of certified organic cotton clothing and bluesign labelled products. The refurbishment in August/September has made the shop more energy efficient with better lighting and insulation.
- IT : we've redesigned and upgraded network to reduce power consumed onsite.
- Waste : we've significantly reduced our waste to landfill (by 78%). We now send one 240L bin to landfill per week. Not bad for one the country's busiest climbing centres!
- Travel: this is the one area that we've not improved on. Due to the higher number of guest setters travelling to London, we have more carbon emissions than in previous years, but less mileage. Must do better.
- Electricity consumption has gone down quite a bit. We have yet to analyse all of our monitoring data, so we don't yet know what changes are most effective.
- Water consumption has remained constant despite increased demand from our garden because we are using rainwater and greywater to irrigate.
- The garden saw many developments in 2011, most of which are reported by Ida on this blog. Key ones included a greywater filtration system, a wildlife pond and many more plants.
- Our two big events - the annual garden party and xmas party- were very low impact with minimal waste.
- We awarded two Castle eco-grants in 2011 to staff to be able to volunteer their time to environmental charities.
- We continue to offer Bike To Work scheme and eco-days (bonus holidays for sustainable travel) to staff.

We're able to do all this because of the support of our shareholders, our Board of Directors and the continued commitment of all of the staff. Thank you!

Audrey Seguy, Managing Director
audrey@castle-climbing.co.uk

Environmental Report 2010

Each year, we take on the mammoth task of looking at the environmental impact of everything we do - from hosting parties to buying loo roll and everything in between. You can download a copy of our report here. Be warned it's a big piece of work.
If you don't want to go through it all, here are the main points:
- Our carbon footprint has gone down slightly by about 6% to 117.09 tonnes CO2e. This isn't the dramatic decrease we'd hoped for, but we're still laying the groundwork for the big changes to come.
- In 2010 we opened The Castle Shop. This not only has diversified our business and improved the customer experience, but it's also given us a chance to engage with suppliers about sustainability.
- 2010 was also our first full year with the Castle Garden. Highlights include a bountiful summer crop, two beehives, community mini-plots, a huge composter, a swale to filter grey water and lots of digging!
- We've installed electricity monitors on all our circuits so we can see exactly where our electricity is being used.

If you want more- just download the report.

Happy reading,

Audrey

Environmental Report for 2009

Following up on the runaway success of our Environmental Report 2008, the team and I have come up with the sequel... the Environmental Report 2009! You can download it here Annual Environmental Report 2009. To summarise we were directly responsible for 125.07 tonnes of CO2e. That’s not that much better than the previous year (136.79 tonnes CO2e) but that’s because the carbon footprint only tells a small part of the story. So much else has happened in 2009 including major changes to our Cafe supply chain, the start of our garden, our own eco-build (Training Room 3) and lots and lots of research into water, waste, passive heating/ventilation, climbing holds, recyclable paper and so much more.

If you have any questions about this, just send me an email: Audrey@castle-climbing.co.uk

Annual Enviromental Report - 2008

Well if you're looking for some riveting reading this weekend, I can't do better than recommend our Annual Enviromental Report. This covers the period between January and December 2008 and will act as the baseline year for us to measure our improvements from. It took a little while to put together because we've had to do a lot of research about the methodology and we've tried to format it so that it will work consistently with future reports.

The short story is that we were directly responsible for 136.79 tonnes of CO2e. Rubbish. That's nearly 50 return flights to Australia. That would take 137 trees one century to absorb. Most of it is due to the electricity and heating we used. We're working on that.

We're monitoring all of our circuits to find out where this electricity is being used. We're considering ways of running the Cafe using less energy. We're looking at how we can modify the building so that the heating and ventilation can be done without too much power. We're going to change over all of our lighting to low-energy lighting and we'll probably repaint the walls and floor tiles so that we need less light. So that's what's on the cards for 2010.

Audrey

Annual Environmental Report 2008

Powered Out - Part 2

Well, our two-week testing period is over and the results are in. Just by exercising a bit of self-control and turning off our computers when not in use we've managed to cut down our inactivity hours by 30%! Not too bad but, to be honest, I was expecting a bit more progress. At least we've found out what computers are our worst offenders and can put some measures in place. I was a bit embarrassed to realise that my computer is the third worst! So I'm going to be extra-careful about turning my computer off and I've also asked that other people using my computer (weekends mostly) do likewise.

Audits, Codes and Blogs

Well if I thought that launching the EP was the hard part, I was wrong. Now comes the real nitty gritty of auditing, assessing, reporting and monitoring.

Thankfully most of the really boring stuff is for Audrey to sort out. She is currently working on an Environmental Report for 2008 (including our Carbon Footprint) and getting us Acorn registered, both of which require a lot of paperwork and writing of action plans.

For my part, I have tried to bring some sort of order to the timeline of changes and started this blog with the intention of letting our customers and the wider public know what we're up to: why we started this, where we started and how far we've come. A common worry has been that we'll get too focused on the EP and lose focus on our business: climbing. With so many plans afoot for developing the climbing within the centre, I don't see this as a real concern (though I might need to find some more inspiring climbing magazines for the cafe again - they seem to have been replaced with one called "Rhubarb").

Other changes in progress at the moment are:

• Improving our bike parking facilities


• finding an alternative for disposable ice packs


• subsidies for staff to buy bicycles


• trying to find more vegan/vegetarian alternatives in the cafe


• researching low energy lighting solutions


• monitoring wind power potential


• monitoring the power circuits


• Researching agroforestry potential for the garden

And now the EP launched, I'm off for a year's sabbatical from the Castle but will be watching this space closely for many more exciting and radical changes. It's something I'm really proud to be involved in, as I've come to think in the last 9 months that preventing "runaway global warming" is the single most important thing humanity can do, and in fact has to do now. To paraphrase Leo Murray in Wake Up Freak Out: Those who came before didn't know about this problem and those who come after will be powerless to do anything. It's fallen to us to do something about it. These are exciting times.

Sieta

Thank you from the boss

Hi Everyone,

THANK YOU.

The Environmental Policy launch was a great success because everyone pitched in and helped out. I have heard so much positive feedback from our customers and other people who attended the day. A few personal mentions:

Janos- your food was divine. Thanks.

Ray – your illustrations and creativity made the event look amazing. Your support for the policy over the past months has really helped get everyone enthused.

Kerry- Thank you for all your hard work- you’ve done more things for this than I can begin to mention. Your commitment was evident when you stayed until the bitter end (nearly 11?)

Dean – In addition to all of the research that you’ve done for us on the issues, thank you for the tents and sorry about the banner.

Steve – It really meant a lot to us that you came down just for this on Saturday and your speech introducing the film was just right.

I’m sorry if I missed out specific people who organised things (Sieta, Min with the DJs, Caroline, etc…) but the list would be endless!

OK, now the policy is officially launched and we’ve got to keep the ball rolling! There will be new information on the Environmental Policy Intranet and the website this week. The Castle Enivronmental Awards will be publicised this week on the Intranet and by email.

In the meantime I’m going to be working on our Enivronmental Report 2008 and getting accreditation for our Environmental Management Scheme.

Audrey.

Environmental Policy is Launched

EP Launch Festival 2009

On Saturday 30th May, we launched our new Environmental Policy in style with a festival in the garden, DJs and a film powered by bicycles, a free BBQ, workshops, stalls and a surprising amount of organic pear cider! The environment must have sensed what we were up to and been pleased with our new initiatives as the weather was absolutely perfect!

…So where did our journey start? It’s a bit hard to say – it was mostly a dawning realisation that things can’t go on as they are. About 9 months ago, The Castle’s CEO Steve Taylor approached the core managers and the board of directors with his thoughts about the state of the planet. He’d been reading up on climate change, carbon emissions and peak oil and become certain that if he didn’t act now in any and every way he could then he too would be to blame for runaway global warming – the point of no return for human life on our planet.

Needless to say, if we weren’t already switched on to the urgency of the situation (and some had been for years) we all got excited by Steve’s approach that “now is not the time to panic or despair, now is the time to act!” as it became obvious that we can’t rely on governments to help us, and it is not enough to make individual changes in our own lives – businesses like us HAVE to change the way we do things.

Since last September, The Castle managers and staff have been reading books, watching films, debating vegetarianism, planting vegetables, going through the rubbish, looking at light bulbs, writing policy and trying not to panic. Finally around April we came up with our Vision Statement:

Our aim is to make The Castle Climbing Centre a benchmark for environmental and economic sustainability and to demonstrate that there is a place for sport and commerce in a sustainable future without compromising financial success and high standards.

The full Environmental Policy (EP) can be found here

And a thankyou letter to staff from Audrey here.

Included in it are our goals of:

• Producing our own energy
• Capturing our own water
• Zero waste to landfill by 2015

No greenwash here!

Our launch party was to be a celebration of our exciting new policy that has brought about so many changes since we began just talking about it, and with some help from our friends it was one of the best festivals The Castle has ever seen. (We might even do it every year…)

It wouldn’t have been what it was without all the other inspiring organisations who joined us on the day:

Magnificent Revolution (bicycle-powered DJ, film and workshop)
The Energy Saving Trust (info on helping everyone save energy in their homes)
Greenpeace (info on taking action for the environment. And lending us their tents)
Climate Camp (info on camping for climate action)
Growing Communities (organic local veg boxes)
The Pangea Project (veggie BBQ and delicious curries)
AK Press (Anarchist and Environmental literature)
Small Mountains (illustrations of the EP journey)
The Age of Stupid (the film)
Transition Finsbury Park (part of the Transition Towns Network)
Ecoclimber (climb harder, climb greener)
Ecoactive (the worms!)
Sustain London (the alliance for better food and farming and the lovely Ida with a planting workshop)
Capital Growth (2012 new green spaces in London by 2012)
London Plains (seasonal cookery demo. Get in touch with Deborah via Growing Communities)
The DJs: Ed, Mike and Simon.
(sorry if I missed anyone!)

Of course our journey does not stop here – it has only just begun!

Finally – the biggest thanks must go to you, the humble climber. For getting excited, for getting involved, for coming along and joining us in our love of climbing. It’s our love of climbing that has got us where we are and we hope to help preserve our wonderful climbing habitats for future generations.

Sieta

Calling in the experts

Some solutions are fairly obvious when it comes to conserving energy: turn off light switches, switch off computers, close the door to keep out the cold etc but some things are more tricky. Even more so with our Grade 2* listed building that lets in rain and cold through the skylights in winter... and manages to keep it warm and humid in the summer. Helpful.

We do have a few building features that will help us be cooler in summer and warmer in winter such as a huge roof, tall towers creating draughts and nice thick walls but we can't radically alter the look of the building or original features due to our heritage listing. For these reasons we have asked a few people to help us with greening our building. We've commissioned an Energy Options Survey from Fulcrum (a founding member of the UK Green Building Council) and appointed our architects Cook Townsend to project manage the building work.

Hopefully when the building work is done, we'll not only have a building that is much more energy efficient, we'll also have a nicer space in which to climb and work.