Every little bit helps

Any lunchtime chat or back-deck banter at Corporate Protection reveals just how many environmental champions we have in our midst. Regular visitors to this blog will also know how important sustainability is to Corporate Protection at all levels of operations.

For many years, we’ve kept a close eye on our environmental impact. As Corporate Protection Office Manager, Julie Chapman says – “If you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” And it is these facts and stats, combined with best corporate practices, that have informed our many strategies to reduce our carbon footprint and minimise harm to the world we live in and share.

Our sustainability strategies include:

• Measuring carbon emissions generated by our:
  • office activities
  • vehicle fleet
  • commercial air travel
• Publishing our annual Sustainability Plan which reports on:
  • carbon emissions
  • current initiatives
  • targets and strategies for future improvements
• Ensuring a well-maintained and energy-efficient vehicle fleet
  You’ll remember our recent bulletin on purchasing our first hybrid site vehicle – the mercurial Toyota Rav-4 Hybrid Powertrain – seen (but rarely heard) zipping around one of our major export terminals
• Monitoring and improving office energy efficiencies, especially lighting, computers, and air conditioning. We have undertaken a sizable project to upgrade and insulate our plant room and air-conditioning units. This best practice strategy to drive efficiency in power consumption is a great example of how acting for the good of the environment also saves money.

Everyone in our offices contributes to this culture of sustainability including the ethical disposal of waste:

• Under Keith (our IT Manager) and his team, we donate old IT equipment to schools and indigenous groups.
• Bottles and cans are separated and taken to glass or aluminium recycling depots.
• Our supplier, Fuji Xerox, collects all our ink/toner cartridges
• We have Orange Shred-X bins for disposal of sensitive paperwork.
• We have a dedicated green skip bin for paper and cardboard recycling.

As Julie says, “Don’t be a tosser. Paper doesn’t grow on trees, you know.”

And thanks to Julie, we’re happy to be adding:

• Batteries – covering AA, AAA, D, C, and 9-volt variants, and
• Pens – both the plastics and the inks from markers, highlighters and regular pens can be reused, repurposed or recycled.

These items are then taken to our local Officeworks as part of their recycling effort.

Or as Julie often reminds us – “Every little bit helps. Sustainable is both achievable and attainable.”

Your turn: What wasteful practices do you see in your workplace? And what sustainable initiatives would you like to see to fix them? Let’s see if we can make them happen too.