I thought it would be pertinent to give an update on where we are with our green journey here at Durham Wildlife Trust. Last time I put together a blog post we were just setting about to collect our carbon data and start comparing some of our figures. 

We were also just embarking on our Investors in the Environment, Bronze accreditation. 

The journey so far has been long, complex and incredibly interesting. I have come from a standing start, as many of you reading this will have. I had little knowledge about managing carbon in an organisation before taking ownership of our green journey, but what I did have was passion for the topic and some determination that we would see this through. I am keen to ensure we set a good example and do much more than just pay lip service to a topic so large. 

We have had many areas to consider: 

Data Collection and Collation 

Essentially, what we mean by collating and collecting data is that we have gone back through every (yes, every) invoice and bill and recorded the usage amounts from those bills. (In ‘business as usual’ we just recorded the financial information and didn’t spend time analysing the usage unless it was out of the ordinary). 

It did take time to teach ourselves how to record this information and going back over a two-year period was painstaking at times if we are honest. 

However, now it is done we have a full and comprehensive set of data, which we have been able to use to benchmark ourselves against other Wildlife Trusts and similar organisations. We are now working out how we can record this information more efficiently in the future. Once it becomes part of business as usual, we will know that we have made real and lasting change.  

We defined our boundaries and calculated the emissions relating to Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions.​ 

Scope 1 and 2: 

Scope 1 and 2 are emissions that are from sources that are owned or controlled by Durham Wildlife Trust.  

• Premises – fuel, water and electricity. 

• Fleet, Machinery and Equipment – fuel used by DWT owned/leased vehicles and machinery has been included.  

Scope 3​: 

Scope 3 are the emissions which are the consequences of the activities of Durham Wildlife Trust.

Durham Wildlife Trust have restricted its Scope 3 emissions to:​ 

• Grazing Livestock​ 

• Business travel​ 

• Water supply and water treatment ​ 

• Volunteer travel (Estimated)​ 

• Staff commuting ​ 

This has meant that we have been able to benchmark ourselves against the other 47 Wildlife Trusts to see where we differ and start to gauge what changes we need to make. 

We also have agreed some calculations, with help from The Wildlife Trust’s federated movement, for carbon sequestration (removal of carbon from the atmosphere) via land we own or manage. This is a very complex calculation in its own right with no fixed or agreed measurements globally and has called upon many experts with vast knowledge on the subject. 

Below is the table of results for our carbon status. This currently puts us in a strong carbon negative situation, when we take into account the sequestration abilities of the land we own. 

Carbon Reduction Strategy and Action Plan 

As part of our Investors in the Environment process, we have created several new working documents that have proven incredibly useful. Even without going through the accreditation scheme I have found these documents and the time spent pulling them together a really helpful way of working through things we can do to hit our reduction target. 

First of all, we had to set that reduction target. We have set our reduction target at 3% annually for the next five years. For reasons we will come on to this target is for our operational activity only and does not include emissions from our livestock. 

Secondly, we created a Carbon Reduction Strategy and Action Plan. The Action plan included how we might set actions to address usage of: 

Electricity Consumption (Heat), Travel Fleet (The Trust’s vehicles), Travel commute (Staff and Volunteers), Water, Waste, Electricity Consumption (Light), Resources (Paper, Ink, Cleaning Products etc) 

As well as:  

• Communication plans for staff and supporters
• Environmental Projects (such as a Trustee Carbon/Green away day – on Teams)
• Increasing information about public transport to our sites) and
• Plans for procurement (like stationary, cleaning and our coffee shops) 

We then created specific action plans for:  

Waste – Including changing our waste providers and investing in new bins in our centres and out on our flagship reserves. 

Travel – Hybrid working, investigating electric charging/vehicles etc 

Capital Works – We know we have two very old buildings with inefficient heating systems – we set some plans about how we might go about addressing this. 

Wider engagement across the organisation 

We have held a carbon away day with our Trustees to look at two challenging areas: 

Livestock – How do we reduce emissions for this essential part of our work and in doing so, do we contravene the biodiversity gains that the livestock bring? 

Carbon Credits - We are carbon negative as a whole organisation due to the nature of our work in managing land for wildlife (although we still want to reduce our operational carbon emissions as we know we can do better) but what options do we have for looking after that carbon storage in the future? We agree as an organisation that we don’t want to ‘sell’ our credits, but is there potential for investment in protecting them? 

I am pleased to finish by saying that we were delighted that the Investors in the Environment team recognised our hard work and commitment and actually awarded us the Silver accreditation, which was actually our target for the end of March 2023, so I would call that a win! 

Next steps are to get that Green accreditation and to ensure we fully embed all of this positive activity into our everyday business as usual.