Sustainability Newsletter - March 2024

Planet

Boosting energy efficiency across the network Saving as much energy as possible is a key part of our plans to become a more sustainable business and to do this, we’re investing in a range of improvements across the business. For example, the solar panel installation – as well as a new substation to operate them – is now in progress at T2. The panels will have the capacity to generate 3 megawatts of electricity, which will translate into a significant reduction in carbon emissions, as well as a major saving on our energy bills. In fact, as energy costs continue to climb, we expect to start seeing financial return on investment in around three years. Another innovation that’s paying dividends is our recent upgrade of the batteries in our narrow aisle forklifts in the warehouses. The new, more efficient Tensor batteries have a longer lifespan than those we used previously and also deliver longer run time, which means less charging. We expect this will save almost 40 tonnes of CO2 per year as well as a significant financial saving. We’re also reaping the benefits of the large LED installation we carried out last year – the data is in for 2023 and we can see a 7% decrease in consumption across the 169 sites where the lights have been put in place compared with 2022. That’s 450,279 kWh saved, which equates to 87.30 tonnes of CO2.

We’re electrifying As part of our commitment to reducing our carbon emissions - and the wider impact we have on the environment - we’re rolling out electric vehicles (EVs) at branches across our network. Many of our customers are in towns and cities, so carrying out a larger proportion of our last-mile deliveries using zero-emissions vans reduces the pollution we create in these areas, while also cutting our overall CO2 output. We now have 100 all-electric Vauxhall Combo-e and Vivaro-e vans across our commercial fleet and plans are in place to increase this number further in future. Additionally, more than 200 of our colleagues have now completed EV training and the feedback we’ve received from the branches using EVs has been very positive. As well as the van roll-out, we’re also trialling an exciting range of less traditional electric delivery vehicles at selected branches, including motor scooters, mini electric delivery vans from Runhorse and powered cargo bikes. If the trials go well, you could well see these kinds of vehicles being introduced in a branch near you soon.

We’re rolling out electric vehicles (EVs) at branches across our network.

The panels have the capacity to generate 3 megawatts of electricity, which will translate into a significant reduction in carbon emissions, as well as a major saving on our energy bills.

We expect this will save almost 40 tonnes of CO2 per year as well as a significant financial saving.

We now have 100 all-electric Vauxhall Combo-e vans across our commercial fleet.

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4 | April 2024