SEPTEMBER 2020 NET ZERO
Key benefits of a behavioural change
programme using Carbon Psychology
● Analysis of your staff’s behaviour to determine the most effective interventions
to enhance energy efficiency and drive down energy costs.
● A bespoke programme designed to work with, rather than against, your
workforce’s psychological make-up. Indeed, employee motivation is typically
increased through engagement and participation.
● The potential to produce quick and effective reductions in carbon emissions
and energy consumption.
● Tools to encourage energy-saving behaviours that staff are likely to establish
and repeat, thus making them enduring rather than a ‘one-off’.
● Typically behavioural measures don’t require much capital and operational
investment, meaning you can achieve bottom line impact quickly.
● Provides real-life data to evidence the behavioural, qualitative aspect of
CSR objectives.
are already recognised as being
a critically high-level threat.
These issues must, therefore,
be addressed by manufacturing
businesses at a strategic level if
we are to ensure a successful,
sustainable economy.”
None of this is possible,
concludes Burrows, without a
concerted effort from industrial
leaders. Prior to COVID-19, the
tide was very much in favour
of achieving Net Zero, and it’s
vital that momentum isn’t lost.
The benefits of doing so go
beyond the ‘feel-good’ factor:
“Sustainability gives a business
advantage on a global scale, and
with increasing costs of waste
and energy there’s a business
incentive to become more
sustainable and cost effective,”
he says. “Net Zero is becoming a
fundamental part of operations,
and will help companies survive
a turbulent environment, so
business leaders need to fully
embrace it. Understanding
the cost – not financially, but
from an environmental or
waste perspective – of each and
every part produced will soon
become part and parcel of the
manufacturing process.
“We work with one of the UK's
largest industrial energy users,
and they have a complete freeze
on CapEx, which is fine, but
they refuse to look at any energy
projects aside from spending their
own cash. This means they’re
missing out on some major
savings, because there’s just not
the right level of understanding at
the top of the business.
“This is a problem across
manufacturing: there needs to be
a step change. There are better
ways of working than just putting
your head in the sand.”
any firm receiving funds must commit to a series
of ambitious targets, including a reduction in
greenhouse gas emissions. The first company
announced as a recipient of funds was Celsa
Steel, the UK’s largest manufacturer of steel
rebar. Others, including JLR and Tata Steel, are
allegedly in discussion. However, reports suggest
that the environmental requirements have caused
bailout plans with some companies to collapse
– something that Warren Percival, director at
environmental consultancy RSK, says gives a
sense of the challenge ahead.
“The failure of some high-level Project
Birch talks highlights the fact that greening
the manufacturing industry is anything but
straightforward,” he says. “Manufacturers have
already spent considerable time and effort to
achieve some of the more challenging (and some
of the easy) wins over the emissions that they
control directly, known for the purposes of carbon
reporting as Scope 1 and Scope 2.
“To reduce Scope 1 and 2 emissions further,
manufacturers may have to make major changes
with significant CapEx implications. This could
include replacing machinery with alternatives that
would probably need new or retrained operators.
This prospect has some in the industry up in arms;
Welsh MP Stephen Kinnock spoke out about the
prospect of job losses if Tata was forced to shut
its Port Talbot blast furnaces, replacing them
with electric arc. But could this be an opportunity
to redress a skills shortage and opportunity to
enhance job opportunities?”
Percival is adamant, however, that for all
their faults, schemes like Project Birch represent
the large-scale thinking that is needed. “If we
are to meet the domestic and global challenge
that climate change presents, more needs to be
done across the manufacturing sector to address
decarbonisation and job security, including repurposing
job roles into less polluting processes,”
he says. “This is a challenge which could be seen
as too difficult given the current crisis, but the
medium- and long-term effects of climate change
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