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Our Green Commitment

Our Green Commitment


Environmental Sustainability Management Plan



Vision and Goal



Berry Street believes all children should have a good childhood, growing up feeling safe, nurtured and with hope for the future.

We recognise that this includes a future where children can live within a healthy environment and look forward to a sustainable future. As part of our 2007-10 Strategic Plan, Berry Street formalised a goal to promote environmentally responsible practices and become a leader in the not-for-profit sector in environmental sustainability management.

In response to this goal, we established an Environmental Sustainability Task Group that developed our Environmental Sustainability Management Plan which outlines our objectives, targets and actions related to reducing the impact on the environment from Berry Street’s activities as well as influencing change within the communities in which we work.

To achieve our goal of improving and promoting environmentally responsible practice across Berry Street and becoming a leader in the Not-for-Profit sector, we have developed the following objectives:

1. Improve our environmental performance and communicate with stakeholders

2. Position Berry Street for opportunities to partner with other organisations

3. Facilitate knowledge transfer beyond our organisation

4. Increase employee and client engagement

5. Create cost savings and re-inject funds for further improvement of our environmental performance


Key Areas of Focus



The Environmental Sustainability Task Group determined the following areas of focus for this plan:

1. Water
2. Waste
3. Procurement
4. Greenhouse gas emissions (comprising of electricity, natural gas and fleet fuel consumption)


Objectives for Key Areas



Based on the Key Areas, we have adopted the following specific objectives:
  • Reducing our resource consumption (water, electricity/gas, fleet fuel & procurement)
  • Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions (electricity/gas, fleet fuel)
  • Increasing our green procurement
  • Reducing our waste to landfill
  • Educating our stakeholders on how they too can reduce their impact on the environment


Key Performance Indicators



To track our performance against our strategic objectives we have established the following KPIs as part of the Environmental Sustainability Management Plan:

Water
  • Total metered water consumption (kL)
  • Total metered water consumption (kL) per EFT

Waste
  • Total waste to landfill (tonnes)
  • Total waste recycled (tones)
  • Proportion of waste that is recycled

Procurement
  • Total number of A4 reams used
  • Number of A4 reams used per EFT
  • % of procurement decisions demonstrating consideration of environmental impact
  • Total number of letterhead reams used

Greenhouse gas emissions
  • Total Scope 1 & Scope 2 emissions (including electricity and fleet contribution)
  • Total GHG emissions per employee (tCO2e / EFT)

Putting the Plan into Action
The agency-wide commitment to the environment and our specific actions to reduce our impact on the environment includes:
  • Active staff involvement in local Green Groups and an organizational Environmental Sustainability Working Group that develop advice and ideas to reduce our impact on the environment, track activities included in organizational and local Action Plans, review results from our GREEN SURVEY of staff, and tracks and reports progress against KPIs
  • Working with young people in our care and other service users to inform them of how they can be more environmentally conscious
  • Continuing our focus on reducing the impact of our fleet, through more fuel efficient vehicles and expanding the hybrid vehicles within the fleet
  • Reducing paper consumption and increasing green procurement of paper and related products
  • Decreasing our waste to landfill through an increased profile of recycling and making use of food waste
  • Working in partnership with existing and new partners to deliver a more sustainable organisation

Reporting
Baseline data:
  • The baseline year is 2010/11
  • For the year 2009/10, where data has been available, Berry Street will track against the targets. However, to ensure a consistent baseline year, Berry Street will restate targets to be consistent with 2010/11 baseline year

Reporting:
  • Data is to be reported internally on a quarterly basis
  • Data will be reported externally on an annual basis through our Annual Report