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Green Futures October 2011
Skanska is a Forum for the Future partner. www.skanska.com
www.greenfutures.org.uk
Dax Lovegrove reveals the tricks of a few new trades.
Photo: iStockphoto
“People need to be shaken out of their comfort zones”
We all do it. When buying something that matters, most of us stick to the places we know – the hairdresser, the car repair shop, even the takeaway. In business, it’s the same. When a building company wants to purchase concrete or windows, they go to familiar suppliers. Better the devil you know. So what happens when companies want to make a step change and source products that are greener? Enter the minefield. “If you’re starting from scratch it is pretty hard distilling what’s green and what’s not”, says Jonathan Hines from Ashden Awards winners Architype, which specialises in sustainable architecture. He recalls buying windows for a school built to rigorous Passivhaus standards (see image): “Getting the right window at the right price took a lot of effort.” The variety of accreditation schemes, drawing on different and complex criteria, didn’t make it any easier. “What’s more, we don’t trust many of them”, adds Hines. Architype isn’t alone in finding reliable information on suppliers’ standards hard to come by. Joe Ravetz of the Centre for Urban and Regional Ecology at Manchester University explains that some benchmarking studies are based purely on what the companies themselves say. It doesn’t help that increasing numbers are making green claims about their products. “They may have [what appears to be] a good green policy”, says Hines, “but it doesn’t mean that what they build is actually green.” So, it’s small wonder that when a building contractor wants to green up its act, it opts for the supplier it already knows and trusts, rather than approach a new one. Does this matter? The trouble is that the combination of greenwash on the supply side, and the
fact that many construction companies are unwilling, or unable, to do their homework, means the best suppliers are likely to be missed. “Who supplies what to construction companies tends to be a question of who you know and what favours are required for passing contacts on”, says Ravetz. “The industry is very fragmented, and information is poorly communicated.” Bad communication about good suppliers is something construction multinational Skanska, named Green Company of the Year 2011 by The Sunday Times, has decided to tackle. Skanska admits that even among its own staff it struggles to ensure everyone knows where to find the best buy. (To be fair, it does have 55,000 employees across three continents.) Its answer is the Supply Chain Green Solution Award, now in its second year, which encourages suppliers to come forward with their green products. The idea is that the profile given to shortlisted companies will raise awareness of their work around Skanska and encourage procurers to give them a go. “People need to be shaken out of their comfort zones”, says Sustainability Manager Daniella Holt. Skanska is also spreading the word about its green finds more widely, through collaboration with the Modern Built Environment Knowledge Transfer Network. This platform, led by BRE and funded by the Technology Strategy Board, aims to increase the application of innovation in the built environment. The first Green Solution Award winner was the design and installation service provider Prater. It won not because of any groundbreaking widget, but for really trying to embed green standards in its overall approach. Runners-up included The EcoCrib, a retaining wall made from 100% recycled plastic; a watertight manhole designed by drainage company CPM to last for at least 120 years; and Lafarge’s Extensia concrete flooring , which is strong enough to support a heavy load on a thin slab without adding steel fibres to the mix, so cutting carbon by as much as 20%. Both the range of innovations out there and the general ignorance of them are symptoms of the rapid growth of the green building industry. The number of people attending the Green Build trade show this year was double that of 2010, while the International Business Times describes green building as moving “in just a few years from obscurity to a significant trend”. And not too soon. The built environment accounts for 40-50% of our global draw on natural resources, and so the potential impact of truly green products and attitudes is huge. The UK’s Green Building Council publishes a statistic from which we should all take cheer: CO2 emissions caused by the built environment in the UK are down 20% in the last 20 years. Not a lot of people know that. – Charlotte Sankey
Photo: Architype
A new awards scheme helps green building suppliers stand out.
Gamechangers Some of the boldest critiques of big business are coming straight from the top. Should we be surprised? No. Leaders grappling with today’s economic and ecological challenges are among the best placed to see that the road ahead won’t lead to long-term success. In the words of BSkyB’s CEO Jeremy Darroch: “If you simply chase growth for the sake of it, without thinking of the broader impacts, ultimately, that is not going to be sustainable.” Or as Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever, presents the challenge: “We need to grow responsibly, we need to grow differently.” The search for new ways to do business is on. Expect to see a proliferation of ‘transformation’ plans, following the likes of Ian Cheshire, CEO of Kingfisher, who means “to fundamentally lower [the] impact” of the DIY giant. But are today’s big hitters our best hope? They could be, but while mainstream pioneers are looking for new ways to succeed within natural limits, WWF has identified some exciting new contenders with the potential to change the game. So, what are these radicals – some start-up businesses, others new alliances – doing differently? And what can the incumbents learn from them? For a start, new businesses and services are overturning the assumption that growth depends on producing more stuff. Businesses can cut their use of natural resources dramatically by harnessing the value of the things we, as individuals or communities, already own. Take peer-to-peer lending and leasing of goods and skills, facilitated by the likes of Ecomodo and Zilok. Anyone can sign up online in a matter of minutes, and offer to share household goods or skills with colleagues, friends or neighbours. So now others might benefit from the fondue set you use once a year, or the kite you never have time to fly. Or you could offer to be a cook for an evening, or give the odd language or music lesson, perhaps. And you choose whether, and how much, to charge. The facilitating website simply takes a small cut from the fee, at the expense of the borrower. It’s a clever model, bypassing the natural resource inefficiencies in most ‘buy and sell’ deals, from manufacture to sales to distribution. Some high street retailers are eyeing the idea with interest, but they are yet to make the leap. In time, we might even see partnerships emerging between peer-to-peer enterprises and retailers. Another innovation is around ‘open loop’, where one business’s waste becomes another’s resource. The UK’s National Industrial Symbiosis Programme (NISP) pairs organisations that produce waste with ones that can put it to effective use. Founded by industrial solutions company International Synergies, it has brought together council recycling officers, housing associations, waste contractors and SMEs to identify opportunities for collaboration. Trevor Knipe, one of the company’s directors, calls it “speed-dating for wastes”.
www.greenfutures.org.uk
The possibilities he sees range from turning expanded polystyrene packaging into insulation, to converting old mattresses into bedding for cows. The NISP methodology is being replicated across the globe, from Hungary to the Chinese industrial zone of Tianjin. WWF has also found that new business is breaking away from fossil fuels. It is becoming increasingly evident that organisations and goods could be powered entirely by renewables by the middle of this century with today’s technology – and consumer demand is rising to the prospect. But some cutting edge players are looking even further. Not content with merely reducing their environmental footprint, they have ambitions to restore natural and social resources. Take Ecuador, where the Fund for the Protection of Water (FONAG), a private mercantile trust, is collecting payments from downstream water consumers to pay for watershed management, conservation and access to water upstream. The scheme’s success has sparked plans for ten other water funds in the region, as well as in Peru and Mexico. If these green gamechangers have one thing in common, it’s the readiness to ask seemingly simple questions: what can we fairly take, and what can we give in return?
“Peer-topeer lending and leasing is growing rapidly”
Dax Lovegrove is Head of Business and Industry at WWF. To browse WWF’s online bank of green gamechangers and read its new report on the top 50 innovators visit: www.wwf.org.uk/innovation For interviews with leading CEOs, visit: www.wwf.org. uk/talkingtransformations WWF-UK is a Forum for the Future partner. www.wwf.org.uk
Upstream Ecuador, funded by downstream consumers
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