A responsibility to sustainability.
Landscape Services recognises our responsibility to both our country and to our shared global environment.
As such we are committed to both Commercial Services Group’s and Kent County Council’s Environmental Policies. This includes a drive to achieving zero net carbon emissions by 2030.
As a Group we are working through all environmental impacts that our organisation has or creates internally; as such we have calculated that our group’s total footprint, in tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e), is 978 tCO2e. More specifically, Landscape Services has a proportion of 67.7 tCO2e as of April 2022.
Acquisitions for Energy
In April 2022 Commercial Service Group announced the acquisition of Bowerhouse II Solar LTD. The 94-acre solar farm holds more than 39,000 solar panels and further enhances our relentless commitment to support customers with vital decarbonisation and net zero projects. The Somerset based farm will be managed by fellow CSG brand LASER Energy, who are experts in carbon and energy management to the public sector.
Landscape Services are audited twice a year by BSI (British Standards Institution) to demonstrate the effectiveness of our systems and management in operation regarding our impact on the environment.
Alongside this there is an Environment Working Group which meets quarterly to understand risks and opportunities on all environmental matters for the Group. We have KPIs on energy emissions, water usage and overall emissions reductions that our services provide.
Moreover, we have already made significant changes within our business by replacing plant & tools to battery or hybrid powered where we can as well as electric vehicle usage for some operations.
Zero waste to landfill
In order to tackle our footprint and support our customers in achieving their sustainability objectives we execute an ongoing commitment to zero waste to landfill, which we achieve consistently through an excellent working relationship with our committed waste management partners.
Single use plastics are an issue of concern because, although all our waste is either composted, recycled or baled for energy production, we are fully aware of the damaging impact of throwaway plastic production and energy consumption. We are actively working to keep them out of our waste stream by selecting environmentally progressive suppliers, materials, and products.
We are working with the industry to develop a plan to replace all our plant, equipment and vehicles currently operated by fuel, with carbon neutral options over the next 10 years.
For our many grounds maintenance, landscaping and arboricultural customers we regularly support with several other sustainable and carbon reducing activities which have a direct impact and potential impact for the future. These include:
- Water harvesting on sites where this is possible, to include allotments across the South East.
- Reduction in paper-based processes to ensure sustainable digital solutions are in place for workflow management. We have digitised many of our activities through our innovations programme.
- Reviewing customer’s biodiversity plans and how we can support in maintaining or growing this aspect of the landscape. Many of our public sector customers are facing climate emergencies or have significant goals to reduce their footprints therefore we work with them to understand these, and we align our activities where possible.
- Scheduling proposals to reduce the carbon impact of travel and job completions. Reducing travel, fuel consumption and smarter planning.
- Reducing the number of cuts or allowing higher grass length during particular periods without impacting on aesthetics or the public.
- The effective use of mulching for beds providing a reduction in watering and longevity of plants.
- Often for our wood waste that is generated from our Arboricultural activities we chip the wood with our own woodchippers either on site or at our depots and donate chippings or logs to customers, farmers, or allotments
Whilst we have achieved a significant amount of progress in our organisation, we continue to work through numerous options that we are currently assessing for the future.
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