Green Offices for Dummies pot

Make your office work for you and the environmentGreen Offices Avery Limited 2nd Edition... Office workers don’t feel they have the power, equipment or knowledge to become green at work.

Make your office work for you and the environment

Green Offices

Avery Limited 2nd Edition

Published by

John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

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ISBN: 978-0-470-66911-2 Printed and bound in Great Britain by Page Bros, Norwich

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 Authors: Nicky Amos CSR Services and Footprint Communications.

Welcome to Green Offices For Dummies, your

smart and friendly guide to doing your bit for the environment, and improving the way you work in the process

Today, most people feel that considering the ment is important At home, many people are taking positive steps towards being green And yet, when people go to work, they leave all this on the doorstep!

environ-Why? Office workers don’t feel they have the power, equipment or knowledge to become green at work

This guide aims to change all that

The tips and advice in this book aren’t only about ing to protect the environment; they’ll also help to improve your workplace and increase your profits

help-With the right knowledge and equipment, you’ll see that working for the environment also means working for your business Running a business has to be profit-able, but it no longer has to cost the earth!

About This BookThis book aims to provide you with information to change the way you work It’s full of useful ideas to empower you to play your part in ‘greening’ your office This guide can help you to influence those around you, and inform colleagues of ways they can join you in creating a better workplace and a better environment

Foolish Assumptions

In writing this book, we made some assumptions about you:

✓ You work in an office

✓ You want to make your office greener, work smarter and save money

✓ You know that being green is important but want some information on how exactly to be green in your office

How This Book is Organised

Green Offices For Dummies is divided into three small

but perfectly-formed parts:

✓ Part I: Giving Your Office the Green Light Head

here for a quick introduction about why nies decide to go green and some staggering stats that encourage them to do so

compa-✓ Part II: Going Green in Your Office Get your

hands dirty in this part as you discover all the practical steps you can take to become more environmentally friendly

✓ Part III: (More Than) Ten Helpful Websites We

round off the book with a list of useful websites to encourage and inspire you

2

Icons Used in This Book

We highlight crucial text for you with the following icons:

The Dummies man indicates real-life examples

to illustrate a point and inspire you

The knotted string highlights important mation to bear in mind

infor-Home in on the target for tips to enable you to

be green in your office

Where to Go from Here

As with all For Dummies books, you can either read this

guide from cover to cover or flick straight to the tion that interests you Whether you read it in small doses using the section headings or all in one long ses-sion, you’ll find plenty of information to get you on your way to becoming green in your office

sec-Part I

Giving Your Office the

Green Light

In This Part

▶ Defining the problem

▶ Chewing over the statistics

The great news is that the majority of large

compa-nies in the UK are taking steps to manage their environmental and social responsibilities Over 80% of the UK’s top companies now report their social and environmental impact as part of their annual report and accounts Even for companies that haven’t made a public commitment to corporate social responsibility (CSR), many are taking steps to become greener

Increasingly, legislation has been introduced which affects many offices This covers waste disposal, pre-treatment of waste (such as separating out recycla-bles), hazardous waste disposal (such as computer monitors, light fittings, batteries), WEEE (Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment) and the new Carbon Reduction Commitment For the latest, we rec-ommend checking www.netregs.gov.uk

Nevertheless, there’s always more that can be done, especially when it comes to empowering individual office workers This book aims to help you to join in with the environmental effort!

Considering Why Companies

Go GreenTypically, companies want to go green to:

✓ Comply with environmental legislation

✓ Reduce overheads through better and more cient energy, waste and resource use

effi-✓ Meet the expectations of employees, customers and society

✓ Gain competitive advantage in the marketplace by becoming more responsive to customer concerns and improving their reputation

✓ Take measures to protect the sustainability of their businesses in the longer-term

Green housekeeping needs to form the cornerstone of any company’s environmental agenda Yet many businesses fail to bring their approach to life for office workers by not making environmental responsibility a part of employee workplace practices or company culture Having a ground-breaking green prod-uct or an impressively worded vision for sus-tainability means nothing if the majority of office workers see little or no evidence of a commitment to the environment in day-to-day practice

The Word on the Street:

Listening to Office Workers

If you consider yourself environmentally friendly but find it harder to transfer green thinking from the home

to the desk, you’re not alone According to a OnePoll survey of UK office workers undertaken in January 2010:

✓ 82% of office workers are more environmentally

friendly at home than in the office Personal

action at home delivers tangible results,

some-times in the form of personal benefit such as saving money The same needs to apply in the office – employees take action when they can see

the outcome of their actions

Tropical Tuesday

A leading global business media company held a 100-day campaign to cut energy usage after the facility manager dis-covered that their offices used almost as much energy when the building was empty as when it was occupied

Each employee was encouraged to switch off equipment when not in use – from their computer to their mobile phone charger A series of themed days encouraged energy saving habits, such as Walk Down Wednesday, when all but a few lifts were turned off, and Tropical Tuesday, when the air con-ditioning was turned off These efforts stripped 10% off the company’s monthly energy bill of £32,000 and saved a total of 78,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide

✓ 69% of office workers feel that it’s important that

UK companies are environmentally responsible and that office life can have a big impact on the environment This figure reflects widespread rec-

ognition of the need for companies to take direct responsibility for their actions Employees regard

a company’s culture as vital to instilling attitudes and behaviours

✓ 48% of employees admit they’re less conscious

about turning the lights off at work because they’re not the ones paying the bills 46% came clean about regularly chucking paper in the normal rubbish when the recycling bin is nearby This demonstrates how many people

leave their eco-conscience at home when they go out to work Companies need to realise that shar-ing knowledge, ideas and tools are critical to shar-ing environmental responsibility Understanding the bigger picture helps position individual actions

in the right context

✓ 64% say lack of empowerment, facilities and

communication are the key reasons why they’re not greener at work People are often given inad-

equate advice at work on how to make their time there count in positive ways People make the most difference when they’re empowered and educated about the simple steps they can take

✓ 37% say nothing’s stopping them at all! A strong

leadership vision and regular reminders can go a long way to galvanising support and increasing

motivation within the whole office.

✓ 34% of employees say they’re aware of their

company’s environmental targets The actual

proportion of companies with environmental gets is likely to be higher than 34% This figure suggests that companies are generally poor at communicating their policies to office workers or

tar-making them part of the CSR culture Just 18% of office workers are told about these targets when they start the company

✓ 58% of office workers try to reduce waste at

work to be green at the office, 50% reuse items but only 34% limit energy consumption and just 11% are looking at the whole picture and pur- chasing wisely in the first place Education and

training can broaden employee knowledge of the full extent of their company’s impact on the envi-ronment to help them identify and implement a wider range of leaner, greener working practices

Staggering statistics

Did you know?

✓ Business is responsible for discarding 5 million tonnes of paper every year and most of this ends up in landfill

✓ Nearly 80% of the world’s original old growth forests have been logged or severely degraded 40% of the world’s industrial logging goes into making paper and this is expected to reach 50% in the near future

✓ The average office worker uses 20,000 sheets of paper a year and generates 1 tonne of waste every year – that’s

100 black bin bags

✓ Office buildings have an insatiable appetite for ity Equipment such as lighting, air con, computers,

electric-printers and photocopiers can often be left on 24 hours, seven days a week – even when no one’s working!

✓ At least half of all office waste is considered to be high

grade – that means expensive, non-recycled paper and

card

✓ 70% of office waste is recyclable but only 8% ever makes

it as far as a recycling bin

✓ Landfill sites in the UK are due to run out during the next decade To discourage the use of landfills, the price of the landfill tax for companies will rise from £8 per tonne per year to £72 per tonne in 2013

✓ Many office buildings are built from materials that don’t come from renewable sources and aren’t designed to reduce the amount of heat and air conditioning they use

In fact, modern offices with air con and ventilation can use up to twice as much energy as non-ventilated offices

✓ Worldwide, the pulp and paper industry is the fifth est industrial consumer of energy Producing recycled paper uses up to 70% less energy than virgin paper, as well as using far less water

larg-✓ For every tonne of 100% post-consumer recycled paper purchased instead of virgin paper, at least 30,000 litres of water and 3,000 to 4,000 kWh electricity is saved (enough

to power a 3-bedroom house for a year)

✓ Nearly a tenth of all greenhouse gas emissions are duced by commercial property in towns and cities – and these emissions are growing at the fastest rate of any sector

pro-Part II

Going Green in Your Office

In This Part

▶ Actions to take today

▶ Finding further info

Part I covers the rather scary stats and the dence that office workers want to do more for the environment In this part, we encourage you to start taking action by offering simple and practical solutions that you can adopt to begin greening your office What are you waiting for? Read on!

evi-ReuseThe first logical step in any green strategy is to con-sider what you can reuse:

✓ Use a bulldog clip to transform scrap paper into bound notepads for internal use – or get the local printer to cut and bind some for you

✓ Donate used furniture and computer equipment to charities, youth groups and other local

organisations

Reduce EnergyWith rising utility costs, all businesses need to be taking a keen interest in reducing costly overheads:

✓ Use window blinds to reduce the temperature in offices from direct sunlight

✓ Turn the heating thermostat down by 1°C and watch your annual heating bill come down by as much as 10%

✓ Use natural ventilation in preference to air tioning Simply open a window! If necessary, use

condi-an electric fcondi-an instead of air conditioning when temperatures rise

✓ Turn off computers when not in use, especially overnight and during weekends (but check first with your IT manager that no essential mainte-nance work needs to be done overnight!)

✓ Switch to energy saving light bulbs and switch off lights during daylight

✓ Consider replacing conventional light switches with movement sensors in areas that aren’t in constant use such as in corridors, store rooms and toilets

✓ Just use the amount of water you need when ing the kettle

boil-✓ Turn off mobile phone chargers at the wall socket when phones are fully charged

Reduce WaterWater is rapidly becoming an expensive and valuable commodity Ask your facilities manager to follow these tips to minimise water used in offices:

✓ Install dual flush toilets which save water when you only need a short flush

✓ Fit water-saving devices such as Hippo, Save a Flush or Hog Bag into toilet cisterns Water com-panies normally provide them free of charge

✓ Install sensor taps, spray taps or push tap buttons

on sinks – this can cut down water usage by 50%

✓ Repair any dripping taps

✓ Think about water usage when buying new ment such as kettles or dishwashers Check that the appliance is water efficient and will decrease water use in the office

equip-Greening the landscape

A natural stone and concrete landscaping company set a target to reduce its £250,000 energy bill by £40,000 a year It embarked on an education campaign across the company’s 3,000-strong workforce, and adopted a number of practical steps such as insulating machinery, plugging leaks in the compressed air system and fitting a timer on the heater