Proving your point

Summary
• The Carbon Trust is developing a tool to enable companies to estimate their carbon footprint.
• ISO 140001 is the international standard for environmental management systems.
• A new standard, BS 8555 offers a staged implementation of EMSs.
• End-of-life requirements may start to be imposed on customers of the timber industry.

Few people can have failed to hear about carbon footprints. Government and certain parts of industry have developed a carbon obsession, with footprints providing a method of comparing the impact of different products and services. Hopefully, sense will prevail and there will be a realisation that although important, carbon is just one of a range of environmental impacts. Concentration on carbon can lead to products and services with reduced carbon footprints but higher overall environmental impacts. Consequently, other forms of measurement and badging systems may be more appropriate.

The carbon footprint of a product is the sum of the carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases emitted across the supply chain for a single unit of that product. The footprint is typically expressed in terms of grammes of carbon dioxide per unit of the product.

Tesco has pledged to publish the carbon footprint of each of its 70,000 or so products. Given that Boots was recently reported to have spent £250,000 on establishing the footprint of just two bottles of shampoo, the Tesco pledge is likely to be watered down in some form, for example, via the use of simple estimates largely based on assumptions rather than measurement. For those companies that cannot invest in teams of footprinters, the Carbon Trust is working on a project to develop a tool to simplify the process. This is eventually likely to be freely available at www.carbontrust.co.uk.

Customer pressure

Regardless of the pros and cons of carbon footprints, the recent interest is a reflection of the trend towards customer pressure on environmental issues. Large retailers see the opportunity to differentiate themselves in the market place and are vying to be the greenest. In turn, they put pressure on suppliers as the majority of the environmental impact of a product is typically determined by the manufacturer and its suppliers. The biggest customer of all is the government, with around £150bn per year to spend, and this leviathan is making green noises and moving in an unco-ordinated manner toward greener procurement.

The timber industry is, of course, well aware of government pressure and the move towards more sustainable procurement, in no small part due to environmental pressure groups prodding a range of government departments. Plenty has been said and written about chain of custody systems and the TTF’s Responsible Purchasing Policy, both of which provide sector specific methods of demonstrating responsible environmental attitudes.

But what about the other mechanisms that exist? ISO 14001 is the international standard for environmental management systems (EMS). It superseded BS 7750 around a decade ago and it provides evidence that a company has implemented an EMS to achieve continual environmental improvement and legal compliance. The improvement side of the equation will often concentrate on items with a payback such as energy and resource efficiency. Consequently, systems implemented in manufacturing operations will often generate both environmental and economic improvements. In reality, the majority of ISO 14001 systems are implemented in order to obtain a badge of achievement, especially for companies competing for work through tenders and which need to tick the “have you got a certified EMS?” box.

Smaller companies

While ISO 14001 has its merits, it is not necessarily beneficial for small companies with no formal quality system and no experience of the associated disciplines. Of greater interest might be the newer standard BS 8555 for the staged implementation of EMSs. This recognises that the implementation of a system might take some time and it provides recognition for companies progressing through this process. Implementation is broken down into six stages and companies can be certified at each or any of the stages. These are:

• commitment and establishing the baseline;
• identifying and ensuring compliance with legal and other requirements;
• developing objectives, targets and programmes;
• implementation and operation of the environmental management system;
• checking, audit and review;
• EMS acknowledgement.

Such systems apply to a company – but product badges are available. Eco-labels have been around for 15 or so years and provide a good demonstration of the pointlessness of a badge which no-one understands or asks for. The aim is to award a Community Eco-label to products and services with reduced environmental impacts. The scheme is voluntary and criteria are established for individual product groups such as paper products, textiles and household appliances.

Despite the apparent lack of interest by consumers, Europe is ploughing more money into the scheme to raise its profile and develop a range of new eco-labels for other products. For example, one has been drafted for wooden furniture, for which there has been an overwhelming lack of support from UK trade bodies. There are various reasons for the UK caution, key amongst which is the inability of UK furniture manufacturers to meet the eco-label requirement. For example, any upholstered product made in the UK must meet the flammability requirements of the Furniture and Furnishings Fire Safety Regulations. If these are met, it is not possible to meet the eco-label requirements regarding limits on flame retardant chemicals. Similarly, reproduction furniture manufacturers will not be able to obtain the traditional appearance of their products whilst sticking to eco-label requirements on solvent reduction. In addition, certification and ongoing costs may be considerable while consumer demand and awareness is low.

Sustainable purchasing strategies

A development of greater interest is the move from tender document tick boxes requiring badges of achievement towards more advanced sustainable purchasing strategies by government. As a non-timber example, in the past six months, the Environmental Industries Unit of the DTI/Defra issued a call for expressions of interest in the supply of mattresses to Her Majesty’s Prison Service (HMPS). This organisation buys 60,000 mattresses and pillows per year and disposes of around 40,000. The combined cost of supply and disposal is estimated to be in excess of £3m per year. The current solution is costly and environmentally unsustainable and HMPS aspires to a zero waste system that meets or exceeds current operational requirements. By 2012, HMPS wants all its mattresses and pillows not classified as hazardous waste to be recycled or reused instead of going to landfill.

Such a call should be of great interest to suppliers of all products to government. The mattress initiative is very much a pilot project to evaluate the level of interest amongst suppliers. Discussions suggest that interest has been high and the pilot can be expected to progress to other areas of purchasing strategy with future implications for the timber industry. The integration of end-of-life requirements, or producer responsibility, has already become enshrined in legislation for certain sectors, for example, through the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Regulations 2006 (for suppliers of electrical goods). If end-of-life requirements start to be imposed by customers of the timber industry, it will lead to some interesting challenges for the sector.

Dr Alistair Bromhead is an independent health, safety & environmental consultant www.abromhead.co.uk.